Photopolymers have become an important recording material for many applications, mainly related to holography. Their flexibility to change the chemical composition together with the optical properties made them a versatile holographic recording material. The introduction of liquid crystal molecules in a photopolymer based on multifunctional monomer provides us the possibility to generate tunable holograms. The switchable holographic elements are a key point for see-through applications. In this work, we optimize the holographic polymer-dispersed liquid crystals composition to improve the performance of tunable waveguide couplers based on transmission gratings and specifically their response under an applied electric field. A variation around 60% in the transmission efficiency was achieved.
Keywords: holographic recording materials; holography; photopolymers; see-through; waveguides.