Abstract

While there are many approaches to making organic polymeric materials with a large third-order nonlinear-optical response, we have concentrated on the class of guest-host systems in which dye chromophores of high third-order susceptibility are dispersed either as solid solutions or chemically attached to an optically linear polymer host. While the nonlinearity of such a system is lower than that of a neat crystal of the same chromophore, the good optical quality and processing ease of the composite makes this material attractive for all-optical device applications.

© 1994 Optical Society of America