Azo polymers for reversible optical storage. Ill. Effect of film thickness on net phase retardation and writing speed

The optical writing phenomenon observed on azoaromatic-containing polymer thin films exhibits a writing rate proportional to the intensity of the writing beam. This property of the mechanism for optically inducing dichroism and birefringence results directly in nonlinear optical behavior in the thin film. The net phase retardation obtainable and the writing rates are functions of the thin-film thickness that reflect this nonlinear behavior.