Related papers: Thermodynamically Stable Blue Phases
We describe the occurence and properties of liquid crystal phases showing two dimensional splay and bend distortions which are stabilised by flexoelectric interactions. These phases are characterised by regions of locally double splayed…
In liquid crystals, if flexoelectric couplings between polar order and director gradients are strong enough, the uniform nematic phase can become unstable to formation of a modulated polar phase. Previous theories have predicted two types…
Polar nematic liquid crystals have two special features, compared with conventional nematic liquid crystals. First, because of flexoelectricity, the combination of polar order and splay reduces the free energy. Second, because of…
We present an investigation of the phase diagram of cholesteric liquid crystals within the framework of Landau - de Gennes theory. The free energy is modified to incorporate all three Frank elastic constants and to allow for a temperature…
We present extensive numerical studies to determine the phase diagrams of cubic and hexagonal blue phases in an electric field. We confirm the earlier prediction that hexagonal phases, both 2 and 3 dimensional, are stabilized by a field,…
We develop a Landau theory for bend flexoelectricity in liquid crystals of bent-core molecules. In the nematic phase of the model, the bend flexoelectric coefficient increases as we reduce the temperature toward the nematic to polar phase…
Blue phase liquid crystals are not usually considered to exhibit a flexoelectrooptic effect, due to the polar nature of flexoelectric switching and the cubic or amorphous structure of blue phases. Here, we derive the form of the…
We have measured the bending-induced polarization of Pb(Mg1/3Nb2/3)O3-PbTiO3 single crystals with compositions at the relaxor-ferroelectric phase boundary. The crystals display very large flexoelectricity, with flexocoupling coefficients an…
Ferroelectric nematic phases are a new class of polar fluids in which spontaneous polarization is directly coupled to the orientational order, providing unique opportunities for creating self-organized materils with spatially modulated…
Polar chiral structures have recently attracted much interest within the scientific community, as they pave the way towards innovative device concepts similar to the developments achieved in nanomagnetism. Despite the growing interest, many…
We present computer simulations of the response of a flexoelectric blue phase network, either in bulk or under confinement, to an applied field. We find a transition in the bulk between the blue phase I disclination network and a parallel…
The free energy of antiferroelectric liquid crystal which takes into account polar order explicitly is presented. Steric, van der Waals, piezoelectric and flexoelectric interactions to the nearest layers and dipolar electrostatic…
The dipole flexoelectric (FE) polarization in liquid crystals is derived in the thermodynamic limit at small distortions and small density. General microscopic expressions for the FE coefficients are obtained in the case of the uniaxial and…
Mesogenic dimers in the twist-bend nematic phase exhibit much higher flexoelectric polarization than in their uniform nematic phase. In order to theoretically investigate this data, we extend the symmetry based linear elastic theory of the…
The flexoelectric (FE) effect provides a linear coupling between electric polarization and orientational deformation in liquid crystals. It influences many electrooptical phenomena and it is used in some bistable nematic devices. A…
We use full nematohydrodynamic simulations to study the statics and dynamics of monolayers of cholesteric liquid crystals. Using chirality and temperature as control parameters we show that we can recover the two-dimensional blue phases…
We numerically study the dynamics of two-dimensional blue phases in active chiral liquid crystals. We show that introducing contractile activity results in stabilised blue phases, while small extensile activity generates ordered but dynamic…
We review recent numerical work investigating the equilibrium phase diagram, and the dynamics, of the cholesteric blue phases. In equilibrium numerical results confirm the predictions of the classic analytical theories, and extend them to…
The recent discovery of nematic liquid crystals with polar order (ferroelectric nematic) has created immense interest. Despite intensive research, several physical properties of this liquid crystal are yet to be investigated and understood.…
Electro-hydrodynamic phenomena in liquid crystals constitute an old but still very active research area. The reason is that these phenomena play the key role in various applications of liquid crystals and due to the general interest of…