Conventional anticounterfeiting strategies based on polymer-stabilized cholesteric liquid crystals frequently exhibit inadequate encryption levels. In the investigation, an encryption strategy was proposed that utilizes the spatiotemporal regulation of chiral molecular diffusion. The integration of a laser-etched polymer film containing right-handed chiral molecules into a left-handed blue PSCLC resulted in the localized vertical diffusion and interfacial racemization. Precise dynamic control of the helical pitch of single-layer liquid crystal materials enables continuous tuning of the structural color across the blue, green, red, and even near-infrared bands. The findings of this study suggest that this particular control mechanism enables the display of multicolor, pixelated patterns within the same device layer, thereby overcoming the color limitations of traditional, single-layer, liquid crystal display devices. The primary innovation of the technology under discussion lies in its dual spatiotemporal encryption mechanism: information undergoes temporal encryption within specific time windows defined by the dynamic diffusion process, whereas spectral encryption at specific wavelengths (e.g., 520-535 nm) is required for correct decryption. Experimental validation demonstrates that this synergistic encryption scheme significantly enhances anticounterfeiting security, offering a highly promising solution for advanced optical information encryption technology.
Li et al. (2026) studied this question.