A reconfigurable arbitrary retarder array as complex structured matter
Chao He, Binguo Chen, Zipei Song, Zimo Zhao, Yifei Ma, Honghui He, Lin Luo, Tádé Marozsák, An Aloysius Wang, Rui Xu, Peixiang Huang, Jiawen Li, Xuke Qiu, Yunqi Zhang, Bangshan Sun, Jiahe Cui, Yuxi Cai, Yun Zhang, Andong Wang, Mohan Wang, Patrick S. Salter, Julian Fells, Ben Dai, Shaoxiong Liu, Limei Guo, Yonghong He, Hui Ma, Daniel Royston, Steve J. Elston, Qiwen Zhan, Cheng‐Wei Qiu, Stephen Morris, Martin J. Booth, Andrew Forbes
Abstract
Tuneable retarder arrays, such as spatially patterned liquid crystal devices, have given rise to impressive photonic functionality, fuelling diverse applications ranging from microscopy and holography to encryption and communications. Presently these solutions are limited by the controllable degrees of freedom of structured matter, hindering applications that demand photonic systems with high flexibility and reconfigurable topologies. Here we demonstrate a compound modulator that implements a synthetic tuneable arbitrary retarder array as virtual pixels derived by cascading low functionality tuneable devices, realising full dynamic control of its arbitrary elliptical axis geometry, retardance value, and induced phase. Our approach offers unprecedented functionality that is user-defined and possesses high flexibility, allowing our modulator to act as a new beam generator, analyser, and corrector, opening an exciting path to tuneable topologies of light and matter.