Abstract

Cumulative thermal effects are seldom studied for the 10 Hz pulse repetition rate that is common in nanosecond optical power limiting applications and z-scan measurements. However, recently they were reported^1,2 for liquid crystals possessing two-orders of magnitude higher thermooptical coefficients than ordinary liquids. The present paper describes another manifestation of cumulative effects in heating of liquid crystals by nanosecond radiation. It appears as induced birefringence effects. Experimental observations of two new phenomena are reported here for incident polarization perpendicular to the molecular director (Fig. 1).

© 2002 Optical Society of America