Bogomol'nyi bound and screw dislocations in a mesoscopic smectic-A
Mesoscale and Nanoscale Physics
2007-05-23 v1 Soft Condensed Matter
Abstract
The de Gennes free energy functional of an infinite smectic-A liquid crystal at the dual point is shown to be topological and to depend only on the number of screw dislocations and the anisotropy. This result generalizes the existence of a Bogomol'nyi bound to an anisotropic system. The role of the boundary of a finite mesoscopic smectic is to provide a mechanism for the existence of thermodynamically stable screw dislocations. We obtain a closed expression for the corresponding free energy and a relation between the applied twist and the number of screw dislocations.
Cite
@article{arxiv.cond-mat/0409695,
title = {Bogomol'nyi bound and screw dislocations in a mesoscopic smectic-A},
author = {Eric Akkermans and Sankalpa Ghosh and Amos Schtalheim},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:cond-mat/0409695},
year = {2007}
}
Comments
4 pages, 2 eps figures