Abstract

The reorientation of optical axis (so-called director) of nematic and cholesteric mesophases by electric field of optical waves was investigated thoroughly during the last decade. It is well known (see, e.g., Ref. ¹) that such reorientation leads to extremely high values of effective third-order optical susceptibilities, up to 1 cm³/erg, the proper mechanism being called orientational optical nonlinearity of liquid crystals (ON).

© 1994 IEEE