Driving liquid crystal lens to extend focus range

A new driving method for a liquid crystal (LC) lens with a hole-patterned electrode is proposed to increase the range of the variable power of the lens. The optical properties of the LC lens are analyzed by an interferometer, and the combination of the driving parameters including the amplitudes and the frequency of the driving voltages are optimized to extend the focus range and keep the aberration below 0.07 wave. For the LC lens used in the experiment with an aperture of 2.0 mm diameter and an LC (Δn = 0.2) layer of 15 µm thickness, the focus range is extended from approximately 3.4 to 5.7 diopters.