Patent ID: 6884549

Claim:
A method of photoinducing at least one linear and/or non-linear optical property in a structure comprising at least one photosensitive molecular material, the method comprising: irradiating said structure with at least two mutually coherent write light beams to modify the orientation of the molecules of said molecule material and/or the nature of the molecules as a function of their orientation, said structure is a confining structure, in that the write beams are parallel to a confinement direction or oblique relative thereto and distribute the linear and/or non-linear optical property(ies) over said confining structure in at least one direction perpendicular to said confinement direction, and causing one or more “-pump-” beams to propagate in or through said photoinduced structure, with propagation thereof in or through said photoinduced structure generating an optical effect giving rise to a property in one or more “-read-” beams propagating in guided configuration in the photoinduced confining structure.