The progress of liquid crystal elastomer actuators in polarization manipulation and active metasurface

Liquid crystal elastomers are programmable deformable materials that can respond to physical fields such as light, heat, and electricity. They have attracted attention due to their widespread applications in biomimetic devices, artificial muscles, sensors, and soft robots. In recent years, liquid crystal elastomer actuators based on photothermal effects have become a promising material with biocompatibility, high tissue penetration ability, and simple and flexible material design. Here, we have studied the response characteristics of liquid crystal elastomer materials under the excitation of linearly/circularly polarized light respectively. In addition, we have reported for the first time the use of liquid crystal elastomer metasurfaces as core components for terahertz wireless communication and imaging systems, including beam splitters, frequency modulators, and tunable beam splitters. The proposed devices demonstrate the promising prospects of mechanical deformation terahertz metasurfaces.