Patent ID: 6924870

Claim:
A liquid crystal diffractive light valve comprising: first and second opposed substrates, each of said substrates having an electrode layer facing each other patterned to form a plurality of pixels, wherein said first substrate imposes a liquid crystal alignment parallel to said substrates and said second substrate imposes a liquid crystal alignment that is perpendicular to said substrates; and a composite formed from a liquid crystal material and a reactive liquid crystal monomer material disposed between said substrates, said composite material phase separated to form crosslinked polymer walls made from said reactive liquid crystal monomer having liquid crystal directors fixed therein regardless of application of an electric field across said electrode layers, and liquid crystal regions between said polymer walls, said liquid crystal regions having liquid crystal directors which are movable when an electric field is applied across said electrode layers; wherein the director axis orientation in the polymer walls and the liquid crystal regions is not uniform and varies throughout the thickness of the light valve; and wherein the pixels are periodic in two dimensions and the liquid crystal regions periodic in one dimension and continuous in a second dimension.