Related papers: Effective free energy method for nematic liquid cr…
The planar bistable device [Tsakonas \textit{et al., Appl. Phys. Lett.}, 2007, {\textbf{90}}, 111913] is known to have two distinct classes of stable equilibria: the diagonal and rotated solutions. We model this device within the…
Monte Carlo simulation, experiment and continuum theory are used to examine the anchoring exhibited by a nematic liquid crystal at a patterned substrate comprising a periodic array of rectangles that, respectively, promote vertical and…
The free energy of the solid and fluid phases of the Girifalco C60 model are determined through extensive Monte Carlo simulations. In this model the molecules interact through a spherical pair potential, characterized by a narrow and…
Study of electrokinetics of nematic liquid crystals (LCs) with dissolved impurities hold utmost importance in understanding director distribution characteristics and modified flow rheology. However, no concrete theory for the non-uniform…
A method is proposed to compute the interfacial free energy of a Lennard-Jones system in contact with a structured wall by molecular dynamics simulation. Both the bulk liquid and bulk face-centered-cubic crystal phase along the (111)…
In this study, we carried out equilibrium molecular dynamics (EMD) simulations of the liquid-liquid interface between two different Lennard-Jones components with varying miscibility, where we examined the relation between the interfacial…
The rotationally-covariant renormalization group equations of motion for the density wave amplitudes in the phase field crystal model are shown to follow from a dynamical equation driven by an effective free energy density that we derive.…
We report on a novel method of dynamically controlling the boundary conditions at the surface of a nematic liquid crystal using a surface flexoelectric effect. By moving the surface directors we show that one is able to manipulate defects…
The Landau-de Gennes free energy is used to calculate the interaction between long cylindrical colloids and the nematic-isotropic (NI) interface. This interaction has two contributions: one is specific of liquid crystals and results from…
Using agent-based simulations of self-propelled particles subject to short-range repulsion and nematic alignment we explore the dynamical phases of a dense active material confined to the surface of a sphere. We map the dynamical phase…
We use a continuum model to examine the effect of activity on a phase separating mixture of an extensile active nematic and a passive fluid. We highlight the distinct role of previously considered interfacial active stresses and bulk active…
Active nematic fluids confined in narrow channels generate spontaneous flows when the activity is sufficiently intense. Recently, it was shown that if the molecular anchoring at the channel walls is conflicting flows are initiated even in…
Based on simplifications of previous numerical calculations [Graf and L\"{o}wen, Phys. Rev. E \textbf{59}, 1932 (1999)], we propose algebraic free energy expressions for the smectic-A liquid crystal phase and the crystal phases of hard…
Nematic elastomers and glasses deform spontaneously when subjected to temperature changes. This property can be exploited in the design of heterogeneously patterned thin sheets that deform into a non-trivial shape when heated or cooled. In…
We study the free energy and dynamics of a closed elastic filament (a one-dimensional curve in two dimensions) whose local internal state is specified by curvature, stretch, and a scalar density field representing, for example, the…
In this paper, we study an elastic bilayer plate composed of a nematic liquid crystal elastomer in the top layer and a nonlinearly elastic material in the bottom layer. While the bottom layer is assumed to be stress-free in the flat…
The interfacial free energy is a central quantity in crystallization from the meta-stable melt. In suspensions of charged colloidal spheres, nucleation and growth kinetics can be accurately measured from optical experiments. In previous…
Using a minimal continuum model, we investigate the interplay between circular confinement and substrate friction in active nematics. Upon increasing the friction from low to high, we observe a dynamical phase transition from a circulating…
We use a free energy functional theory to elucidate general properties of heterogeneously ordering, fast folding proteins, and we test our conclusions with lattice simulations. We find that both structural and energetic heterogeneity can…
We study a discrete version of a biaxial nematic liquid crystal model with external fields via an approach based on the solution of differential identities for the partition function. In the thermodynamic limit, we derive the free energy of…