New functional polymers for liquid crystal displays : review of some recent developments

Polymeric materials play an important role in the construction and performance of liquid crystal displays. New functional polymers are developed to improve the displays on brightness, power efficiency and viewing angle performance. Polymer films with a controlled molecular structure and architecture provide new polarization optics to convert non-polarized light into polarized light with higher efficiency than the traditional polarizers based on stretched iodine doped poly(vinyl alcohol). Other films provide a polarization compensation function to maintain an angular invariant net optical retardation of the display device and therewith a better contrast to wider viewing angles. Color generation by non-absorbing methods is believed to improve on the display brightness. Special control of the liquid crystal alignment by photo-sensitive orientation layers, polymer protrusions or photo-formed polymer walls provide multiple director patterns within a single pixel to average out angular LC effects