Liquid Crystal Displays: Fundamental Physics and Technology

Preface

The liquid crystal display (LCD) has become the principal modern medium for visual information and image appreciation. It is now a pervasive and increasingly indispensable part of our everyday lives. Apart from its utility, this marvelous device relies on a science and technology that I believe makes the device all the more attractive and interesting.

This book is organized to highlight the basic physics, chemistry, and technology behind this intriguing product, and while describing the LCD, I attempt to provide some insight into that physics, chemistry, and technology. I believe that the history of the development of the LCD is equally intriguing, and thus I make excursions into tales of the principal contributors and their achievements and thinking in their research. Finally, the allure of liquid crystal television has made it a coveted symbol of modern life worldwide, and so apart from the technical descriptions, I also describe how the LCD business has become a global enterprise.

I attempt to describe the physics and technology in a clear and simple manner understandable to an educated reader. Further, I have endeavored to pay attention to literary exposition as far as I am able, in the hope that, in addition to describing the technology, the book may also provide some literary enjoyment. Of course whether I have succeeded here depends on the reader’s assessment.

This book is written at an introductory level suitable for advanced undergraduates and first-year graduate ...