High‐Speed, Continuous, Large‐Angle Nonmechanical Beam‐Steering with Liquid Crystal Etalons

Liquid crystal (LC) is a strong candidate material for nonmechanical beam‐steering devices, which are highly demanded in self‐driving vehicle applications. Conventional LC‐based approaches rely on the refractive index distribution resulting from the spatial distribution of LC alignments. This study proposes a new approach using three components: a superluminescent diode (SLD), an LC etalon, and a blazed grating. Broad‐spectrum light from the SLD passes through an electrically tunable LC etalon, which narrows the bandwidth and generates wavelength‐swept light. The swept light is introduced into the blazed grating for steering. The steering system achieves a large steering angle (≈7°) with an average switching time of 225 μs in the quasistatic modulation mode. Moreover, the system achieves a steering angle of 3.5° at a high steering speed of 1 kHz in the dynamic modulation mode.