Patent ID: 8325416

Claim:
An optical element comprising: a material thermally switchable between a first stable state and a second stable state different from the first stable state, wherein the material has a transmissivity different in the first stable state as compared to the second stable state; a switching mechanism for switching the transmissivity of one or more selected areas of the material between the first stable state and the second stable state thereby to change the a transmissivity in the visible spectrum of one or more selected areas of the optical element, wherein the material is bistable or multistable and has the first stable state and the second stable state as its two bistable states or as two of its multistable states, wherein the optical element is configured for use in a display that switches between a multi-view directional display mode and a single view display mode, and the switching mechanism switches between the first stable state and the second stable state to switch the display between the multi-view directional display mode and the single view display mode, and wherein, by applying a thermal pulse to the material once, the material is able to be maintained in the first stable state or in the second stable state until another thermal pulse is applied, even after the application of the thermal pulse is removed.