Electro-optic properties of liquid crystal cells with nanowall electrodes.

This work fabricates a nanowall electrode for achieving advanced liquid crystal (LC) devices and improving LC displays. The nanowall electrode consists of indium-tin-oxide (ITO) sheets stacked with nanowalls, and the nanowalls have a height and thickness of 4 µm and 500 nm, respectively. The high aspect ratio (8.0) of the nanowalls sets the nanowall electrode apart from previous electrodes. A flat electrode that comprises only ITO sheets is used to evaluate the nanowall electrode. The LC cell with the nanowall electrode exhibits better electro-optic properties than the LC cell with the flat electrode due to the strong transverse electric field and small subelectrode gap of the nanowall electrode. Especially, the operating voltage (3.7 V) of the nanowall cell is 36% smaller than that (5.8 V) of the flat cell. Therefore, nanowall electrodes have potential in LC lenses, LC antennas, metaverse displays, and digital optics.

Effects of electrode structure and dielectric anisotropy on the performance of VA-FFS LC mode.

Vertically-Aligned Fringe-Field Switching (VA-FFS) liquid crystal (LC) mode is known for its intrinsic submillisecond fast response time due to existence of self-imposed boundaries of virtual walls. In this paper, we investigate the effects of electrode structure and LC dielectric anisotropy. The performance of VA-FFS with conventional 2D and 3D electrode designs are compared. By using the 3D electrode design, higher transmission and faster response time are found possible as a result of having less dark states and at the same time having more virtual walls surrounding a 3D pixel. In the second part, we investigate the difference between VA-FFS LC mode employing LC materials with positive and negative dielectric anisotropy, while keeping all other factors the same. We found that, in general, positive LC materials can provide faster response time whereas negative LC materials can provide higher transmission. In the case of 2D design, however, negative LC is found to have rather unexpected slow response times due to i) existence of a 2-step switching process and ii) disappearance of virtual wall, which have never been reported or published before for VA-FFS. In this paper, we will show that, by using a 3D design, both of these problems for negative LC can be improved such that 3D design can help maintain the stability of virtual walls and also help bring the response time of negative LC closer to that of positive LC. VA-FFS LC has been actively researched for VR/AR application in recent years.

Insight and subjective measures of quality of life in chronic schizophrenia.

Lack of insight is a well-established phenomenon in schizophrenia, and has been associated with reduced rater-assessed functional performance but increased self-reported well-being in previous studies. The objective of this study was to examine factors that might influence insight (as assessed by the Insight and Treatment Attitudes Questionnaire [ITAQ] or PANSS item G12) and subjective quality-of-life (as assessed by Lehman QoL Interview [LQOLI]), using the large National Institute of Mental Health Clinical Antipsychotic Trials of Intervention Effectiveness (CATIE) dataset. Uncooperativeness was assessed by PANSS item G8 ("Uncooperativeness"). In the analysis, we found significant moderating effects for insight on the relationships of subjective life satisfaction assessment to symptom severity (as assessed by CGI-S score), objective everyday functioning (as assessed by rater-administered Heinrichs-Carpenter Quality of Life scale), clinically rated uncooperativeness (as assessed by PANSS G8), and discontinuation of treatment for all causes (all P > 0.05 for statistical interaction between insight and subject QoL). Patients with chronic schizophrenia who reported being "pleased" or "delighted" on LQOLI were found to have significantly lower neurocognitive reasoning performance and poorer insight (ITAQ total score). Our findings underscore the importance of reducing cognitive and insight impairments for both treatment compliance and improved functional outcomes.

Design and fabrication of birefringent nano-grating structure for circularly polarized light emission.

Three different nano-grating structures are designed as phase retarders that can transform linearly polarized light to circularly polarized emission for the wavelengths of 488 nm, 532 nm and 632.8 nm, respectively. Gold based nano-grating structures with various periods are fabricated by utilizing laser interference lithography. The ellipticity of all circularly polarized emission can reach around 90% such that the structure has great potential in the applications of three-dimensional (3D) display. The effects of the slit width and metal thickness modulations are simulated by rigorous coupled wave analysis (RCWA) method. Besides, the field intensity and phase of the transmitted TM and TE waves are also simulated to understand their polarization characteristics.

Review of psychiatric services to mentally disordered offenders around the Pacific Rim.

This article was commissioned to collate and review forensic psychiatric services provided in a number of key Pacific Rim locations in the hope that it will assist in future dialogue about service development. The Board of the Pacific Rim College of Psychiatrists identified experts in forensic psychiatry from Australia, Canada, China, Hong Kong, Japan, Russia, Singapore, Taiwan, and the US. Each contributor provided an account of issues in their jurisdiction, including mental health services to mentally disordered offenders in prison, competence or fitness to stand trial, legal insanity as a defense at trial, diminished responsibility, and special forensic services available, including forensic hospitals and community forensic mental health services. Responses have been collated and are presented topic by topic and country by country within the body of this review. The availability of mental health screening and psychiatric in-reach or forensic liaison services within prisons differed considerably between countries, as did provisioning of community forensic mental health and rehabilitation services. Diversion of mentally disordered offenders to forensic, state, or hybrid hospitals was common. Legal constructs of criminal responsibility (insanity defense) and fitness to stand trial ("disability") are almost universally recognized, although variably used. Disparities between unmet needs and resourcing available were common themes. The legislative differences between contributing countries with respect to the mental health law and criminal law relating to mentally disordered offenders are relatively subtle. The major differences lie in operationalizing and resourcing forensic services.

Plasma clozapine levels and clinical response in treatment-refractory Chinese schizophrenic patients.

PURPOSE: To evaluate clinical efficacy of clozapine in relation with its plasma level in a group of Chinese patients with treatment-resistant schizophrenia. In addition, the relationship between plasma level and side effects were examined. METHOD: Fifty-one patients with treatment-resistant schizophrenia were put on a fixed dose of clozapine at 300 mg/day for 6 weeks. Non-responders to week 6 received 500 mg/day in subsequent 6 weeks. Responders to week 6 continued to receive 300 mg/day. Clozapine plasma levels were checked at weeks 6 and 12. FINDINGS: No association was found between clozapine plasma level, response and side effects. Sodium valproate was found to elevate clozapine plasma level while lowering norclozapine/clozapine ratio. CONCLUSION: Clozapine plasma level was not found to be associated with response and side effect in Chinese treatment-resistant schizophrenic patients. Various explanations were postulated for the lack of relationship observed between clozapine plasma level and response in this population.