
INFORMATION
Home
Group Members
MODELLING
Liquid Crystals
Electromagnetics
RESEARCH DIRECTIONS
Liquid Crystal Devices
Waveguides
PUBLICATIONS
Books
Journals
Conferences
TEACHING
ELEC 2006
ELEC 207P
ELEC 3030
ELEC GC04
QUICK LINKS
Optical Devices
Ghent LC
Group
GID
|
 |
Computer Modelling Research Group
Computer modelling activities in the Dept. of Electronic and Electrical Engineering at UCL were started by Prof. J. Brian Davies who led this research group until his retirement in 1997. The group has been dedicated to the development of mathematical models and computer modelling techniques for electromagnetics, initially applied to microwave and optical waveguides, nonlinear optics and since 1994 also to the modelling of liquid crystal devices, which now constitute the major line of research in the group.
contact: Professor F.A. Fernández.

The group is dedicated to the advanced and comprehensive modelling of liquid crystal structures for displays, photonic and microwave applications. This includes modelling the switching behaviour of liquid crystals, the hydrodynamics of liquid crystals, the optical modelling of liquid crystal cells and the modelling of wave propagation through waveguiding structures containing liquid crystal materials. Current computer models and programs developed by the group are based on a Q-tensor representation of the liquid crystal orientation, including order variation and biaxiality, weak surface anchoring, flexoelectric effects and flow and permit the study of the dynamic behaviour of realistic 3D structures. Applications have included the analysis and design of LC on Silicon (LCOS) cells, for displays and communications, the dynamic study of bistable displays, and other devices where the dynamic behaviour of defects play an important role. One of the current interests is in extending these modelling capabilities further to dimensions where the current continuum theory is not adequate. This will enable us to study structures with features in the range of 10s of nm, as in LCOS cells for the future generation of displays and diffractive devices for communications (reconfigurable SLMs and holograms), reconfigurable photonic band gap structures, the design of nanostructured dielectric films and the inclusion of nanostructures in liquid crystal cells, as surface features or as suspended, moving particles.
For details on current activities, see here
Group Activities Flyer
Current Research Interests
Research Highlights over the last 5 years
Waveguide Modelling (link to be added)

The group has been dedicated to the development of mathematical models and computer modelling techniques for electromagnetics since the beginning of its activities at UCL, with an emphasis on comprehensive and efficient computational methods.
Research highlights in this period included the development of numerical techniques for the analysis of electromagnetic problems, including the least squares boundary residuals method and finite difference and finite element methods for the analysis of electromagnetic waveguides, the development of novel modal analysis methods and the first finite element beam propagation method. It also included the development of an efficient matrix eigenvalue solver for large, sparse systems and mesh generation techniques. These numerical methods were applied to the study of microwave structures, to optical waveguiding structures and to nonlinear optical devices.
- Modal solution solver (link to be added)
- Beam progation method (link to be added)
(Text to be added)
Research Directions (text to be added)

Publications of the group can be found here.
Teaching (link to be added)
Professor. F.A. Fernández currently teaches the following subjects:
Additional course material can be found by clicking
the links above.
3rd and 4th year Projects offered by Professor F.A. Fernández
This page last modified
20 June, 2011
by F.A. Fernández
|
 |
NEWS
Current EPSRC-funded project on Liquid Crystal Applications in Microwaves
see grant details
Recently finished EPSRC project on Microwaves and Liquid Crystals
see grant details
Announcing Q-LCsolver
|