CN-121995662-A - Optical device and optical switching device

CN121995662ACN 121995662 ACN121995662 ACN 121995662ACN-121995662-A

Abstract

An optical device and optical switching equipment belong to the technical field of light. The optical device comprises an electrode module, a first liquid crystal layer, a polarization adjustment layer and a second liquid crystal layer, wherein the electrode module is used for applying different electric fields to two opposite edge areas in the liquid crystal layer, the first liquid crystal layer is used for carrying out first phase adjustment on first polarized light in a light beam under the action of the electric fields, the light beam further comprises second polarized light, the polarization direction of the first polarized light is perpendicular to that of the second polarized light, the polarization adjustment layer is used for carrying out polarization direction adjustment on the polarized light in the light beam passing through the first liquid crystal layer, so that the first polarized light and the second polarized light exchange polarization directions, and the second liquid crystal layer is used for carrying out second phase adjustment on the second polarized light in the light beam after the polarization direction adjustment of at least one first liquid crystal layer and the polarization adjustment layer. The application can solve the problem of poor performance of the optical switching equipment, improves the performance of the optical switching equipment, and is used for the optical switching equipment.

Inventors

WANG LIANG
JIA WEI
ZHANG DEJIANG

Assignees

华为技术有限公司

Dates

Publication Date: 20260508
Application Date: 20241104

Claims (13)

1. An optical device is characterized by comprising an electrode module, at least one first liquid crystal layer, a polarization adjustment layer and at least one second liquid crystal layer, wherein the polarization adjustment layer is positioned between the at least one first liquid crystal layer and the at least one second liquid crystal layer; the electrode module is used for applying different electric fields to two opposite edge areas in each liquid crystal layer in the at least one first liquid crystal layer and the at least one second liquid crystal layer, and the arrangement direction of the two edge areas is parallel to the polarization adjustment layer; Each first liquid crystal layer is used for receiving a light beam incident from one side of the first liquid crystal layer far away from the polarization adjustment layer, and carrying out first phase adjustment on first polarized light in the light beam under the action of an electric field applied by the electrode module; The polarization adjustment layer is used for adjusting the polarization direction of polarized light in the light beam passing through the at least one first liquid crystal layer, and the polarization direction adjustment enables the first polarized light and the second polarized light to exchange the polarization direction; The second liquid crystal layer is used for carrying out second phase adjustment on the second polarized light in the light beam after the polarization direction adjustment of the at least one first liquid crystal layer and the polarization adjustment layer under the action of the electric field applied by the electrode module.
2. The optical device of claim 1, wherein the polarization adjustment layer is a half wave plate.
3. An optical device according to claim 1 or 2, characterized in that the total phase adjustment amount of the first phase adjustment of the at least one first liquid crystal layer is the same as the total phase adjustment amount of the second phase adjustment of the at least one second liquid crystal layer.
4. The optical device of claim 3, wherein the optical device comprises a plurality of the first liquid crystal layers and a plurality of the second liquid crystal layers; The plurality of first liquid crystal layers and the plurality of second liquid crystal layers are in one-to-one correspondence, and the phase adjustment amount of the first phase adjustment of the first liquid crystal layers is the same as the phase adjustment amount of the second phase adjustment of the corresponding second liquid crystal layers.
5. The light device of any one of claims 1 to 4, wherein the electrode module comprises at least two first transparent electrode layers and at least two second transparent electrode layers; One first liquid crystal layer is arranged between every two adjacent first transparent electrode layers, and one second liquid crystal layer is arranged between every two adjacent second transparent electrode layers; the electric field on the first liquid crystal layer is applied by the adjacent first transparent electrode layer, and the electric field on the second liquid crystal layer is applied by the adjacent second transparent electrode layer.
6. The light device of claim 5, wherein the polarization adjustment layer is located between the at least two first transparent electrode layers and the at least two second transparent electrode layers or the polarization adjustment layer is located between the at least one first liquid crystal layer and a target conductive layer; The target conductive layer is a first transparent electrode layer of the at least two first transparent electrode layers, which is close to the second liquid crystal layer, or the target conductive layer is a second transparent electrode layer of the at least two second transparent electrode layers, which is close to the first liquid crystal layer.
7. An optical device is characterized by comprising an electrode module, at least one liquid crystal layer, a polarization adjustment layer and a reflecting layer, wherein the polarization adjustment layer is positioned between the at least one liquid crystal layer and the reflecting layer; the electrode module is used for applying different electric fields to two opposite edge areas of each liquid crystal layer in the at least one liquid crystal layer, and the arrangement direction of the two edge areas is parallel to the polarization adjustment layer; The liquid crystal layer is used for receiving a light beam incident from one side of the liquid crystal layer far away from the polarization adjustment layer, and carrying out first phase adjustment on first polarized light in the light beam under the action of an electric field applied by the electrode module; The polarization adjustment layer is used for adjusting a first polarization direction of polarized light in the light beam passing through the at least one liquid crystal layer; The reflecting layer is used for reflecting the light beams sequentially passing through the at least one liquid crystal layer and the polarization adjustment layer to the polarization adjustment The polarization adjustment layer is further used for adjusting a second polarization direction of polarized light in the light beams sequentially passing through the at least one liquid crystal layer, the polarization adjustment layer and the reflecting layer, and the first polarization direction adjustment and the second polarization direction adjustment work together to enable the first polarization light and the second polarization light to exchange polarization directions; The liquid crystal layer is further used for carrying out second phase adjustment on the second polarized light in the light beam which sequentially passes through the at least one liquid crystal layer, the polarization adjustment layer, the reflection layer and the polarization adjustment layer and is subjected to the first polarization direction adjustment and the second polarization direction adjustment under the action of an electric field applied by the electrode module.
8. The optical device of claim 7, wherein the polarization adjustment layer is a quarter wave plate.
9. An optical device according to claim 7 or 8, characterized in that the total phase adjustment amount of the first phase adjustment of the at least one liquid crystal layer is the same as the total phase adjustment amount of the second phase adjustment of the at least one liquid crystal layer.
10. The optical device according to any one of claims 7 to 9, wherein the electrode module comprises at least two transparent electrode layers; One liquid crystal layer is arranged between every two adjacent transparent electrode layers, and an electric field on the liquid crystal layer is applied by the adjacent transparent electrode layers.
11. The light device of claim 10, wherein the polarization adjustment layer is located between the electrode module and the reflective layer or between the at least one liquid crystal layer and a target conductive layer; the target conductive layer is a transparent electrode layer of the at least two transparent electrode layers that is adjacent to the reflective layer.
12. An optical switching device, comprising an optical device and a plurality of optical ports; the optical device is an optical device according to any one of claims 1 to 6, or the optical device is an optical device according to any one of claims 7 to 11; the optical switching device is configured to perform phase adjustment on light between the plurality of optical ports using the optical device.
13. The optical switching device of claim 12, wherein the optical switching device is a wavelength selective switch WSS or an optical interconnect OXC device.

Description

Optical device and optical switching device Technical Field The present application relates to the field of optical technologies, and in particular, to an optical device and an optical switching device. Background With the development of technology, optical communication networks gradually replace electrical communication networks with advantages of low time delay, low power consumption and the like. An optical communication network uses optical switching devices to exchange optical beams between a plurality of communication devices. Optical switching devices such as wavelength selective switches (WAVELENGTH SELECTIVE SWITCH, WSS), data center optical interconnect (DATA CENTER optical cross connect, DC-OXC) devices, and the like. The optical switching device includes a plurality of optical ports and an optical element, the optical ports being connected to the communication device, and the optical switching device phase-adjusts the optical beams received from some of the optical ports by using the optical element to change the transmission direction of the optical beams, thereby switching the optical beams to other optical ports and further to the communication device to which the optical ports are connected. However, the optical device can only perform phase adjustment on polarized light with a specific polarization direction in the light beam, but cannot perform phase adjustment on polarized light with other polarization directions in the light beam. In order to perform phase adjustment on all polarized light in a light beam, an optical switching device generally separates polarized light in different polarization directions in the light beam, then converts the polarization directions of polarized light in other polarization directions into the specific polarization directions, and finally performs phase adjustment on the light in the specific polarization directions by using an optical device. However, since light of different polarization directions in the light beam is subjected to different treatments in the optical switching device, the polarization dependent loss (polarization dependent loss, PDL) of the optical switching device is large. The PDL of an optical switching device is inversely related to the performance of the optical switching device, and therefore, when the PDL is large, the performance of the optical switching device is poor. Disclosure of Invention The application provides an optical device and optical switching equipment, which can solve the problem of poor performance of the optical switching equipment in the related technology. The scheme provided by the application is as follows. In a first aspect, the present application provides an optical device comprising an electrode module, at least one first liquid crystal layer, a polarization adjustment layer, and at least one second liquid crystal layer. The electrode module is used for applying different electric fields to two opposite edge areas in each liquid crystal layer in the at least one first liquid crystal layer and the at least one second liquid crystal layer, and the arrangement direction of the two edge areas is parallel to the polarization adjustment layer. Each first liquid crystal layer in at least one first liquid crystal layer in the optical device is used for receiving the light beam entering from one side of the first liquid crystal layer far away from the polarization adjustment layer and performing first phase adjustment on first polarized light in the light beam under the action of an electric field applied by the electrode module. The light beam incident from the side of the first liquid crystal layer away from the polarization adjustment layer includes first polarized light and second polarized light having polarization directions perpendicular to each other. The first liquid crystal layer is capable of changing the phase of the first polarized light but incapable of changing the phase of the second polarized light, so that the first liquid crystal layer is capable of performing first phase adjustment on the first polarized light in the light beam but incapable of performing phase adjustment on the second polarized light in the light beam. The polarization adjustment layer is used for adjusting the polarization direction of polarized light in the light beam passing through the at least one first liquid crystal layer, and the polarization direction adjustment enables the first polarized light and the second polarized light to exchange the polarization direction. The second liquid crystal layer is used for carrying out second phase adjustment on second polarized light in the light beam with the polarization direction adjusted by the at least one first liquid crystal layer and the polarization adjustment layer under the action of the electric field applied by the electrode module. According to the above, the light beam sequentially passes through the first liquid crystal layer, the polarization adjustment layer and