Reversible nonreciprocity in photonic structures infiltrated with liquid crystals

Abstract

We demonstrate how to achieve reversible nonreciprocal optical response in a periodic photonic structure with a pair of defects, one of them being a nonlinear liquid crystal defect layer. The twin defect layers structure is symmetric at low intensity and becomes asymmetric above a power threshold corresponding to the optical reordering of the liquid crystal. We show that nonreciprocal effects can be reversed by changing the wavelength as a consequence of the defect mode dependent light localization inside the structure.