Liquid Crystal Device With an Apparent Hysteresis

In prior art, a liquid crystal device is comprised of a pair of substrates provided with a pair of electrodes on the insides thereof respectively and a pair of oriented films symmetrically provided on the opposed insides of the electrodes.

On the other hand, it is most impotant to have a sufficiently large coersive electric field Ec (threshold field) of liquid crystal, for active device structures of a liquid crystal device in which nonlinear elements are arranged in a matrix or a row. Under application of an electric field lower than the Ec, liquid crystal holds its initial state (transparent for example), but when applied with an electric field equal to or stronger than the Ec the liquid crystal is quickly reversed its state (opaque for example). Although an Ec exists both positive (Ec+) and negative (Ec-), the two are not necessary coincident in absolute value.

Such an Ec is faint in smectic liquid crystal, especially in chiral smectic C liquid crystal, so that the performance of a device using the liquid crystal is largely depend on the field strength and the pulse width of an applied pulsed electric field. Because of this, prior art employs for matrix display the existing method known as "AC bias method". Also in prior art a rewriting with a positive field is done by once applying a negative pulsed field and then applying a positive pulsed field which has the be finely controlled in strength and in time.

The bias method, however, requires a somewhat complicated peripheral circuit. In order to simplify the peripheral circuit, it is very important factor that liquid crystal employed has a steady and certain coercive electric field. In prior art some liquid crystal devices have been made with a rather certain coersive field by compromising the frequency characteristics or other performances.

It is therefore an object of the invention to provide a liquid crystal device with an apparent large coersive electric field.

It is another object of the invention to provide a liquid crystal device capable of exhibiting a steady hysteresis loop.

FIG. 1 is a cross section view showing an embodiment of the invention;

FIG. 2 is an equivalent circuit of a liquid crystal device according to the invention;

FIG. 3 is a graphical view showing hysteresis loops of a prior art device and embodiments of the invention.

FIG. 4 is a partial cross-section view of a cluster embodiment of a floating electrode in accordance with the invention.

Referring to FIG. 1, a liquid crystal device according to the invention is illustrated. Between a pair of transparent substrates 4 is a liquid crystal layer 1 such as a twistic nematic, super twistic nematic, or, desirably a ferroelectric liquid crystal. electrode strips 3 and 3' are orthagonally arranged on the opposed insides of substrates 1. On the electrode 3 are a dielectric film 2 and a floating electrode 6 so that a capacitance is formed between the floating electrode 6 and the electrode 3. The contiguous surfaces to the liquid crystal 1 are covered with a pair of oriented films 5 and 5'.

FIG. 2 is an equivalent circuit of the device. In the figure, G.sub.1 and C.sub.1 are the conductance and the capacitance of the dielectric film 2 and G.sub.2 and C.sub.2 are the conductance and the capacitance of the liquid crystal layer 1. If a voltage Vo is applied across the device, the following equation is satisfied at t=0:

where V.sub.1 and Q.sub.1 are the voltage across the dielectric film 2 and the charge accumulated on the dielectric film 2 and V.sub.2 and Q.sub.2 are the voltage across the liquid crystal layer 1 and the charge accumulated on the liquid crystal layer 1.

The thickness of the dielectric film 2 is less than 2000 .ANG. whereas the thickness of the liquid crystal layer 1 is about 2 to 3 microns, so that C.sub.1 >>C.sub.2 is satisfied. Hence, at the initial state, almost all the voltage is applied to the liquid crystal layer 1, namely V.sub.2 .apprxeq.Vo.

Further, the charge Q accumulated on the floating electrode 6 at a time t (sec) is obtained by the equation:

In a case where the thicknesses of the liquid crystal layer and the dielectric film are 2 microns and 1000.degree. respectively and the area of one pixel is 100 microns.times.300 microns, the resistance of liquid crystal layer per pixel is on the order of 10.sup.9 ohm whereas the resistance of the dielectric film per pixel is on the order of 10.sup.13 ohm, whereby G.sub.1 can be neglected in comparison with G.sub.2. Taking the assumption of C.sub.1 >>C 2 and G.sub.1 .apprxeq.0 into consideration, the preceding equation can be rearranged as:

and also obtained are: ##EQU1##

When a sufficient time has elapsed, V.sub.1 =Vo is satisfied.

Namely, at the initial state, almost all the voltage is applied to the liquid crystal layer and, thereafter, almost all the voltage is applied to the dielectric film in turn. On the process, a certain charge is accumulated on the floating electrode.

As a result, even if liquid crystal possesses only a faint coersive field itself, the substantial coersive field is determined by the charge accumulated on the floating electrode between the liquid crystal layer and the dielectric film. By virtue of the substantial coersive field, the liquid crystal layer eventually comes to possess an apparent large coersive field which can be controlled together with the preparation condition of the dielectric film.

Next, a manufacturing process of the embodiment will be described in detail. The transparent electrodes 3 and 3' are formed of indium titan oxide on the glass substrates 4 and 4'. On the electrodes 3 the dielectric film 2 is formed from a ferroelectric material. Namely, a mixture of vinylidene fluoride (VDF) and trifloroethylene (TrFE) diluted with metyl-ethyl-keton at 10 weight % can be used. The copolymer solution is coated on the electrode 3 by a spinner to form the dielectric film whose thickness can be controlled by selecting the rotation frequency of the spinner and the density of the solution. Then the solvent is vaporized and removed by heating. The floating electrode 6 is formed of indium tin oxide (ITO) in the form of a layer or cluster (electrically isolated island-like conductors (as shown at 6' in FIG. 4) with 10 to 1000 .ANG. in diameter) by sputtering. In experimental, the average diameter of cluster was 30 to 300 .ANG. with the average thickness of 10 to 200 and, when ITO was deposited by sputtering to the average thickness of 200 to 2000 .ANG., the floating electrode was formed in a thin film. In case of the floating electrode in the form of a thin film, it must be severed into a plurality of pixels.

Further, the film 5 is formed on the contiguous surface of the floating electrode to the liquid crystal layer, using 1.1.1.trimethyl-silasane. The film 5 is not treated with rubbing. The other film 5' is composed of an aluminium film and a nylon film which has been treated with rubbing.

Finally the periphery of the coupled substrates is sealed off and ferroelectric liquid crystal is disposed therebetween. The liquid crystal may be a blend of S8 and B7. Other examples of ferroelectric liquid crystal are disclosed in Japanese Patent Published Applications Nos. 56-107216, 59-98051 and 59-118744.

As a result, a matrix of pixels with 1 mm.times.1 mm in size is formed. In experimental, a clear coersive electric field has been exhibited in response to voltages of .+-. applied to the device, which has never seen in prior art devices according to silan coupling agents.

FIG. 3 is a graphical diagram showing hysteresis loops of liquid crystal devices. The ordinate is a transmissivity and the abscissa is an applied voltage. In the figure, curves 9 and 9' show the hysteresis loop of a prior art device with no floating electrode and with a silan coupling agent on the upper electrode thereof. The coersive field tends to fluctuate around a very small value. Curves 10 and '10 show the hysteresis loop of an embodiment of the invention in which the dielectric film is a silicon nitride (Si.sub.3 N.sub.4) film with 600 .ANG. in thickness and the floating electrode is a ITO film with 400 .ANG. in thickness. Curves 11 and 11' show the hysteresis loop of the embodiment described hereinbefore in detail.

While the above description has been made to show particular embodiments, many modifications will occur to those skilled in the art. In what follow some examples are described.

Instead of preparation of an oriented film, a shearing method is effective in devices according to the invention. Namely a liquid crystal layer can be oriented by slightly displacing one substrate respective to the other. Also, a temperature graduation method can be used alone or in combination with a rubbing method.

As an oriented film a ferroelectric film can be formed on the contiguous surface of the floating electrode so that the ferroelectric film is materially in contact with the liquid crystal layer. The ferroelectric film and the floating electrode may be formed in the same shape as the underlying electrode strip or in the form of cluster distributed throughout or partially on the electrode.

The invention is also applicable for speakers, printers or other devices in which is utilized the anisotropy of smectic liquid crystal.