A beam scanning apparatus capable of adjusting a refraction angle of transmitted light and scanning a beam to a desired location is provided. In addition, an optical apparatus capable of sensing light reflected from an external object and extracting information about the external object is provided. The beam scanning apparatus includes a rotary meta lens having a plurality of meta areas in which a plurality of fine phase shift elements are arranged, and a rotation drive device that rotates the rotary meta lens. The plurality of meta areas are configured to direct transmitted light to different locations in a scanning area.

A laser beam shaping system includes at least one doped medium which is doped with a dopant and which is optically transparent at the first wavelength range and a beam input or coupling configured to generate or receive a shaped beam that is required to be shaped, the shaped beam being at a first wavelength range and directed towards the doped medium. The system includes an absorbed beam input or coupling configured to generate or receive at least one absorbed beam at a second wavelength range which is different from the first wavelength range and which is directed towards the doped medium. The doped medium has a higher beam absorption characteristic at the second wavelength range than at the first wavelength range, causing the absorbed beam to have a higher absorption than the shaped beam in the doped medium. The doped medium has a coating which allows high transmission of both the first and the second wavelength ranges.

A new Laser scanner system does replace all known laser scanner systems, that either are galvanometer based or not. It makes possible to steer a beam of even high intensity very precisely in one or two dimensions. The system can deflect a beam in very fine steps (deflection angles), with a repetition rate of potentially better than even some GHz.

A possible embodiment includes a cascade of deflection elements, that are based on switching (thin) films. The switching films might be metallic films, or stacks of alternating dielectric films, that change their optical properties under switching electrical loads (planar areas of sufficient dimensions that are switching within ns) and become highly reflectiveto the order of 99,999%. Even other reflective, fast switching films can be usedas long as the highly reflective switching state of the layer (film) is used to select the direction of reflection/deflection of the laser beam. Said film would otherwise be in its state of very high transmission and would let the beam pass throughto some next switching layer that would reflect the beam to a slightly different direction.

Even adaptive wavefront correction can be achieved by the use of switching films, that in addition to the core idea and concept for the laser scanner are arranged in ay matrix, like a CCD, hereby granting the high throughput that might be necessary for a GHz laser scanner adaptive wavefront correction. Possible other applications of such a distortion correction elements exist many in adaptive optics.

From beam steering in laser machining to bar code scanners, to laser based tv systems the proposed system brings technology into existence that is orders of magnitude faster than what is in use right now. Especially in the area of laser based machining and production, it would be possible to produce with a far higher throughput and precision than with conventional galvanometer based systems.

A system includes a spatial light modulator and a controller. The spatial light modulator is configured to perform phase modulation of a light that passes through a liquid crystal by applying individual voltages to the liquid crystal from each of a plurality of electrodes. The controller is configured to control the voltages applied to the liquid crystal from each of the plurality of electrodes based on phase image data. The phase image data represents values of each pixel corresponding to each of the plurality of electrodes by predetermined gradations. The controller converts gradation values, which are the values of each pixel, into voltages input to the electrodes corresponding to each pixel. The controller is configured to change a fluctuation width from a minimum value to a maximum value of the input voltages corresponding to a fluctuation width from a minimum value to a maximum value of the gradation values.

Embodiments of an optical modulator device are described. An example optical modulator includes a ridge laser configured to emit light, a ridge waveguide configured to transition between a transparent state and an absorbing state, and a waveguide tap formed between the ridge laser and the ridge waveguide. The waveguide tap is configured to optically couple a fraction of light generated in the ridge laser to the ridge waveguide. In the transparent state of the ridge waveguide, the ridge waveguide is configured to output the fraction of light for interference with light emitted from the ridge laser. In the absorbing state of the ridge waveguide, the ridge waveguide is configured to absorb the fraction of light. Depending upon whether the fraction of light is output from the ridge waveguide for interference, the output power of the laser seen at the far-field of the optical modulator can be modulated for data communications.

A reconfigurable optical device includes a spatial light modulator and an optical signal generator. The spatial light modulator includes a layer of optically-sensitized carbon nanotubes, and each optically-sensitized carbon nanotube is configured to transition between a conductive state and a semiconductive state responsive to an optical signal. The optical signal generator is configured to provide the optical signal to the spatial light modulator to cause the layer of optically-sensitized carbon nanotubes to form a pattern of conductive nanotubes, the pattern of conductive nanotubes configured to modify interfering signal to form an optical vortex.

According to one embodiment, an optical device includes a liquid crystal element including a first substrate including a plurality of first control electrodes, a second substrate which is opposed to the first substrate and comprises a second control electrode, and a first liquid crystal layer held between the first substrate and the second substrate, and a modulation element opposed to the liquid crystal element, the modulation element including a modulation portion which modulates incident light, and a non-modulation portion which is adjacent to the modulation portion.

A window system for a passenger compartment of a vehicle includes a transparent window having a window treatment, an incident light monitoring subsystem, an incident light management subsystem and a controller. The incident light monitoring subsystem monitors incident light transmitted into the passenger compartment, determines a field of view of a passenger and determines an intensity of the incident light relative to the field of view of the passenger. The incident light management subsystem individually controls a plurality of light projectors to project a light beam that interacts with a subsection of the window treatment to modulate light transparency of one of the subsections of the window based upon the intensity of the incident light in relation to a field of view of the passenger.

An optical device for a display panel. The optical device comprises an optical element (1). The optical element (1) may include a first surface (3) and a second surface (4) opposite the first surface, and side surfaces. The optical device may further comprise a light source (2) facing one of the side surfaces of the optical element (1). The optical element (1) may comprise a compound containing a photoisomer group. The photoisomer group may undergo a photoisomerization under an irradiation of the light source. Accordingly, an illumination area by a light passing through the first surface (3) and exiting from the second surface (4) may increase or decrease.

An active prism structure includes: an isotropic layer made of a photocurable isotropic polymer having a predetermined refractive index n.sub.p and stacked on a substrate; and a birefringent layer made of a birefringent material having an ordinary refractive index n.sub.c and an extraordinary refractive index n.sub.e and stacked on the isotropic layer, an interface between the isotropic layer and the birefringent layer is formed in a prism shape, and refractive index differences occurring at the interface between the isotropic layer and the birefringent layer are different according to a polarization direction of incident light. The active prism structure is configured such that the refractive index differences are different according to the polarization direction of the incident light, and thus, it is possible to change a refraction angle and refraction direction of the prism by controlling the polarization direction of the incident light.