Reflective twisted nematic liquid crystal displays .2. Elimination of retardation film and rear polarizer

Reflective twisted nematic liquid crystal displays consisting of just one input polarizer, a liquid crystal cell, and a rear reflector are discussed. We first show that all such display modes reported in the literature can be depicted systematically in a series of parameter space diagrams. Then by making use of such diagrams as a guide, we show that other new high quality reflective display modes can be obtained. The three parameters that are varied are the input polarizer angle alpha, the liquid crystal twist angle phi, and the cell gap-liquid crystal birefringence product d Delta n. A full numerical simulation which takes into account of the liquid crystal director deformation under the application of an electric field was used to optimize such displays. Experimental results agree well with the theoretical predictions. (C) 1997 American Institute of Physics.