Pancharatnam-Berry phase optical elements for wave front shaping in the visible domain: Switchable helical mode generation

We report the realization of a Pancharatnam-Berry phase optical element [Z. Bomzon, G. Biener, V. Kleiner, and E. Hasman, Opt. Lett. 27, 1141 (2002)], for wave front shaping working in the visible spectral domain, based on patterned liquid crystal technology. This device generates helical modes of visible light with the possibility of electro-optically switching between opposite helicities by controlling the handedness of the input circular polarization. By cascading this approach, fast switching among multiple wave front helicities can be achieved, with potential applications to multistate optical information encoding. The approach demonstrated here can be generalized to other polarization-controlled devices for wave front shaping, such as switchable lenses, beam splitters, and holographic elements. (c) 2006 American Institute of Physics.