chapter 1 Optical properties and applications of ferroelectric and antiferroelectric liquid crystals E E Kriezis, L A Parry-Jones and S J Elston University of Oxford, UK -- chapter 2 Electro holography and active optics Citizen Watch Company Ltd, Japan / chapter 3 On the use of liquid crystals for adaptive optics Naval Research Laboratory, USA / chapter 4 Polymer-dispersed liquid crystals Universita` ‘Federico II’ di Napoli, Italy INFM – Istituto Nazionale per la Fisica della Materia / chapter 5 New developments in photo-aligning and photo-patterning technologies: physics and applications Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, China / chapter 6 Industrial and engineering aspects of LC applications Seiko Epson Company, Japan