Photoalignment and photopatterning has been proposed and studied for a long time [1]. Light is responsible for the delivery of energy as well as phase and polarization information to materials systems. It was shown that photoalignment liquid crystals by azodye nanolayers could provide high quality alignment of molecules in a liquid crystal (LC) cell. Over the past years, a lot of improvements and variations of the photoalignment and photopatterning technology has been made for photonics applications. In particular, the application of this technology to active optical elements in optical signal processing and communications is currently a hot topic in photonics research [2]. Sensors of external electric field, pressure and water and air velocity based on liquid crystal photonics devices can be very helpful for the indicators of the climate change. We will demonstrate a physical model of photoalignment and photopatterning based on rotational diffusion in solid azodye nanolayers. We will also highlight the new applications of photoalignment and photopatterning in display and photonics such as: (i) fast high resolution LC display devices, such as field sequential color ferroelectric LCD; (ii) LC sensors, including polarization sensors for polarimetric cameraas; (iii) LC lenses with a variable focal distance; (iv) LC E-paper devices, including electrically and optically rewritable LC E-paper; (v) photo induced semiconductor quantum rods alignment for new LC display applications; (vi)100% polarizers based on photoalignment; (vii) LC smart windows based on photopatterned diffraction structures; (vii) LC antenna elements with a voltage controllable frequency.

Vladimir G. Chigrinov is Professor of Hong Kong University of Science and Technology since 1999. He is an Expert in Flat Panel Technology in Russia, recognized by the World Technology Evaluation Centre, 1994, and SID Fellow since 2008. He is an author of 6 books, 31 reviews and book chapters, about 322 journal papers, more than 677 Conference presentations, and 121 patents and patent applications including 38 US patents in the field of liquid crystals since 1974. He got Excellent Research Award of HKUST School of Engineering in 2012. He obtained Gold Medal and The Best Award in the Invention & Innovation Awards 2014 held at the Malaysia Technology Expo (MTE) 2014, which was hosted in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, on 20-22 Feb 2014. He is a Member of EU Academy of Sciences (EUAS) since July 2017. He got A Slottow Owaki Prize of SID in 2018. He is 2019 Distinguished Fellow of IETI (International Engineering and Technology Institute). Since 2018 until 2020 he works as Professor in the School of Physics and Optoelectronics Engineering in Foshan University, Foshan, China. 2020-2024 Vice President of Fellow of Institute of Data Science and Artificial Intelligence (IDSAI) since 2021 distinguished Fellow of Institute of Data Science and Artificial Intelligence. Since March 2022 he is A Fellow of National Academy of Technology for his contributions to Information Electrical and Electronic Research.