Polarization stop bands in chiral polymeric three-dimensional photonic crystals

High-quality polymeric 3D spiral photonic crystals are fabricated via direct laser writing. Polarization stop bands for circularly polarized light are observed, leading to 5% transmittance for the circular light polarization, which matches the handedness of the helix, and 95% for the other polarization (see figure). The experimental results are in good agreement with theoretical calculations.