Over 200 °C Broad-Temperature Lasers Reconstructed from a Blue-Phase Polymer Scaffold.

Abstract

Blue-phase liquid crystal (BPLC) lasers have received extensive attention and have potential applications in sensors, displays, and anti-counterfeiting, owing to their unique 3D photonic bandgap. However, the working temperature range of such BPLC lasers is insufficient, and investigations are required to elucidate the underlying mechanism. Herein, a broad-temperature reconstructed laser is successfully achieved in dye-doped polymer-stabilized blue-phase liquid crystals (DD-PSBPLCs) with an unprecedented working temperature range of 25-230 °C based on a robust polymer scaffold, which combines the thermal stability and the tunability from the system. The broad-temperature lasing stems from the high thermal stability of the robust polymerized system used, which affords enough reflected and matched fluorescence signals. The temperature-tunable lasing behavior of the DD-PSBPLCs is associated with the phase transition of the unpolymerized content (≈60 wt%) in the system, which endows with a reconstructed characteristic of BP lasers including a U-shaped lasing threshold, a reversible lasing wavelength, and an obvious lasing enhancement at about 70 °C. This work not only provides a new idea for the design of broad-temperature BPLC lasers, but also sets out important insight in innovative microstructure changes for novel multifunctional organic optic devices.