Modeling light propagation in liquid crystal devices with a 3-D full-vector finite-element beam propagation method

A full-vector finite-element beam propagation method in 3-D is introduced for the simulation of light propagation in liquid crystal (LC) devices. The three electric field components are expressed in terms of mixed finite elements, providing the correct enforcement of boundary conditions. Moreover, the optical dielectric tensor of the medium can have all its nine elements nonzero, thus allowing the LC director to have an arbitrary orientation. A photonic crystal fiber with a LC infiltrated core and a homeotropic to multi-domain cell are analyzed. Comparison with other existing simulation techniques is provided, in order to validate the accuracy of the proposed method.