Qinetiq Limited

Cambridge Enterprise Limited

Thomas Swan & Co. Limited

Cambridge Correlators Limited

Timothy David Wilkinson

William Alden Crossland

Neil Collings

Adrian James Cable

Melanie Holmes

Brian Robertson

Nicholas A Lawrence

Edward Buckley

Peter Mash

Maura Redmond

Ilias Manolis

Kim Leong Tan

Maurice Stanley

Nicholas James New

David Charles Scattergood

Calum Williams

Tat C B Yu

Steven Warr

The invention relates optical devices, for example pixelated devices such as an optical device having a plurality of coloured pixels, each said pixel comprising a filter structure, the filter structure comprising: a first metallic layer; a dielectric layer over said first metallic layer; and a second metallic layer over said dielectric layer; wherein said second metallic layer comprises a nanostructured metallic layer having a lateral structure with features having at least one characteristic lateral dimension equal to or less than 1 &#x3bc;m, and wherein said second metallic layer is structured to couple light incident on said second metallic layer into at least two absorption modes of the filter structure, one to either side of a target wavelength, such that said filter structure appears coloured at said target wavelength in reflected or transmitted light.

Method of defining an optical filter element and optical device comprising a filter structure

A method of displaying a video image comprises receiving sequential image frames at a processor. Each image frame is processed to obtain a kinoform. A programmable diffractive element such as an SLM represents the sequence of kinoforms allowing reproduction of the image using a suitable illumination beam.

Apparatus and method for displaying a video image

An optical correlator includes an image production device and an image capture device disposed in a common plane. An optical device such as a lens or mirror provides a Fourier transform of image information from the image production device onto the image capture device. An advantage of embodiments of the invention is its small size.

Optical correlator

In an active semiconductor backplane for a liquid crystal spatial light modulator, spacers () which are distributed over the backplane extend above an array of electrical and/or electronic elements and comprise at least two layers essentially of the same material and occuring in the same order as is found in at least one of the electrical or electronic elements, such as an NMOS transistor (). The latter is formed from a stack of layers on a silicon substrate () comprising polysilicon (), continuous silicon oxide () modified to include gate oxide GOX (), metallic gate electrode (), continuous silicon oxide () and a metallic drain electrode () which is coupled to a spaced mirror electrode over the layer (). Likewise, spacer () comprises the layers (and) with metallic () deposited simultaneously with electrodes (). The foot of layer () is differently modified to include field oxide layer () and polysilicon layers thin oxide (). Spacers () are located regularly within the array of transistors ()/mirrors () and also about the array.

Spacers for cells having spaced opposed substrates

An optical switch uses two ferroelectric liquid crystal spatial light modulators () with an interconnect region in between. The switch uses bulk lenses () to focus light from an input fibre array () to a first spatial light modulator (), and from the second spatial light modulator () to an output array (). Each spatial light modulator displays a respective hologram selected from a previously calculated set, to cause a desired switching of light from the input fibre array to the output array.

Optical switching with ferroelectric liquid crystal SLMs

An optical switch uses a polarization insensitive spatial light modulator operating by a double pass through a liquid crystal cell. The switch includes two such modulators in a cross bar arrangement. Different embodiments employing techniques for reducing cross talk are described.

Optical switch including two integrated multiphase SLM's and a wave-plate the wave-plate providing an optical retardance of (2n+1)&#x3bb;/4

An electro-optic device such as a smectic liquid crystal cellwith an active semiconductor backplaneis mounted on a hybrid substrate, for example of alumina or silica. Other active or passive electronic or optical components may also be mounted on the substrate, and interconnected by conductive tracks, for example by wire bonding, and the substrate itself may be mounted on a printed circuit board. The substrate may comprise a heat sink. The arrangement facilitates the safe connection of the liquid crystal cell and good optical alignment thereof.

Electro-optic device

A method is described of optically performing a joint transform correlation starting from images displayed side-by-side on a spatial light modulator illuminated by a collimated light source. The image is focused by a lens onto a camera, the image is recorded by a frame grabber, and processed by a computer. By using a two pass process, the result is a measure of the correlation of the images. The images may be preprocessed in a phase-encoded chequerboard pattern and binarised by thresholding based on the average value of neighbouring pixels.

In active semiconductor backplane ( ), for example for a smectic liquid crystal cell, which comprises an array of electronic or elctrical elements in a first region ( ), logic elements for addressing said array in a second region spaced from the first, and conductors coupling said first and second regions, the first and second regions are sufficiently widely spaced ( ) (providing a &ldquo;glue lane&rdquo;) to permit the presence of an adhesive sealing strip therebetween without substantial contact with the first and/or second regions, even when an opposed substrate is sealed thereto. The backplane may comprise spacers ( ) in the first region and/or glue lane.

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Trumpington, United Kingdom

Timothy David Wilkinson