Readdressable Interconnects With Spatial Soliton Waveguides in Liquid Crystal Light Valves

We excite spatial solitons by reorientational nonlinearity of the nematic liquid crystals, using a photoconductive light valve to implement an external light-driven control of their trajectories. Control spots provide deviations of the solitons and allow implementing various routing operations. We demonstrate 2-bit (4-output) and 3-bit (8-output) spatial demultiplexers and a continuously adjustable X/Y power-dependent junction.