New guest-host dyes of red and purple colour suitable for fabrication ot ultrathin film polarizer from polymerizable liquid crystals are developed. When the absorption spectrum of dye matches the photopic curve, samples with total film thickness below 50 <$E mu>m show good visual contrast.

The simple design of liquid-crystal lenses with single electrode and operation voltage below 5 V is highly desired. We offer a new type of photoaligned liquid-crystal lens, where the refractive gradient is created by voltage application due to the patterned twist angle gradient. In this paper, we present our calculations and experimental data.

Scattering properties of directed polyvinyl alcohol films modified with titanium dioxide or silver nanoparticles and illuminated by a 0,63 <$E mu>m linear polarized He - Ne laser radiation were investigated. Ability of the investigated nanomaterials to depolarize and scatter incident radiation and to form an illumination background close to diffuse scattering was studied.

The derivatives of phenylazobenzoic, phenylazosalicylic acids and azobenzeneazonaphthalene were synthesized and employed to prepare polarizing films based on polyvinyl alcohol (PVA). The single-piece transmittance (<$ET sub 0>), polarizing efficiency (PE), dichroic ratio (<$ER sub d>) of films and order parameter of dyes (<$ES sub dye>) were calculated. It was found that parameters <$ER sub d> and <$ES sub dye> increased as electron-donating of substituents in molecules of phenylazobenzoic and phenylazosalicylic acids derivatives was grown, and the polarizing efficiency of film increased with increasing the order parameter of dye. Development of PVA films dyed with the derivatives of phenylazosalicylic acid and azobenzeneazonaphthalene allowed to obtain polarizers for near UV and visible range of spectrum, respectively. It was also developed a broadband polarizer for 300 - 610 nm.