Related papers: Knotted Defects in Nematic Liquid Crystals
The hydrodynamic stresses created by active particles can destabilise orientational order present in the system. This is manifested, for example, by the appearance of a bend instability in active nematics or in quasi-2-dimensional living…
In this paper we revisit the problem of a nematic liquid crystal in contact with patterned substrates. The substrate is modelled as a periodic array of parallel infinite grooves of well-defined cross section sculpted on a chemically…
Freestanding tubular crystals offer a general description of crystalline order on deformable surfaces with cylindrical topology, such as single-walled carbon nanotubes, microtubules, and recently reported colloidal assemblies. These systems…
Knot theory provides a powerful tool for the understanding of topological matters in biology, chemistry, and physics. Here knot theory is introduced to describe topological phases in the quantum spin system. Exactly solvable models with…
Active nematics are fluids in which the components have nematic symmetry and are driven out of equilibrium due to the microscopic generation of an active stress. When the active stress is high, it drives flows in the nematic and can lead to…
We report hybrid lattice Boltzmann (HLB) simulations of the hydrodynamics of an active nematic liquid crystal sandwiched between confining walls with various anchoring conditions. We confirm the existence of a transition between a passive…
We report on the emergence of stable self-propelled bound defects in monolayers of active nematics, which form virtual full-integer topological defects in the form of vortices and asters. Through numerical simulations and analytical…
Instabilities in thin elastic sheets, such as wrinkles, are of broad interest both from a fundamental viewpoint and also because of their potential for engineering applications. Nematic liquid crystal elastomers offer a new form of control…
Non-equilibrium dynamics of topological defects can be used as a fundamental propulsion mechanism in microscopic active matter. Here, we demonstrate swimming of topological defect-propelled colloidal particles in (passive) nematic fluids…
Liquid crystal elastomers are cross-linked polymer networks covalently bonded with liquid crystal mesogens. In the nematic phase, due to strong coupling between mechanical strain and orientational order, these materials display…
The nematic-superconductor state is an example of a quantum liquid crystal that breaks gauge as well as rotation invariance. It was conjectured to exist in the pseudogap regime of the cuprates high $T_c$ superconductors. The…
Motivated by recent progress in understanding the interplay between lattice and electronic topological phases, we consider quantum-melting transitions of {\it weak} quantum liquid crystals, a crystal and a nematic phase, in which electrons…
We investigate how coupling to fluid flow influences defect-mediated transitions in two-dimensional passive nematic fluids using fluctuating nematohydrodynamic simulations. The system is driven by tuning the fluctuation strength, with…
A spontaneous buckling transition in thin layers of monodomain nematic liquid crystalline gel was observed by polarized light microscopy. The coupling between the orientational ordering of liquid crystalline solvent and the translational…
The ground state of twist-bend nematic liquid crystals is a heliconical molecular arrangement in which the nematic director precesses uniformly about an axis, making a fixed angle with it. Both precession senses are allowed in the ground…
Active fluids display spontaneous turbulent-like flows known as active turbulence. Recent work revealed that these flows have universal features, independent of the material properties and of the presence of topological defects. However,…
We present a hydrodynamic model for a thin spherical shell of active nematic liquid crystal with an arbitrary configuration of defects. The active flows generated by defects in the director lead to the formation of stable vortices,…
Knotted proteins embed a physical (i.e., open) knot within their native structures. For decades, significant effort has been devoted to elucidating the functional role of knots in proteins, yet no consensus has been reached. Here, using…
This review introduces the elasticity theory of two-dimensional crystals and nematic liquid crystals on curved surfaces, the energetics of topological defects (disclinations, dislocations and pleats) in these ordered phases, and the…
We study the organization of topological defects in a system of nematogens confined to the two-dimensional sphere (S^2). We first perform Monte Carlo simulations of a fluid system of hard rods (spherocylinders) living in the tangent plane…