Related papers: Realization of hydrodynamic experiments on quasi-2…
We study a horizontal streaming excited by means of a low frequency and intensity acoustic wave in 2D freely suspended film of thermotropic smectic liquid crystal. Acoustic pressure induces fast periodic transverse oscillations of the film,…
Smectic liquid crystal films a few molecular layers thick that are freely suspended in air are used as a model system to study the coalescence of fluids in two dimensions. High-speed video microscopy is used to observe the coalescence of…
The hydrodynamics of smectic films at an air-water interface is discussed, with particular focus on the viscous response of the film under flow normal to the layers. The corrections to the response functions of the smectic phase, arising…
Investigations of free-standing liquid films enjoy an increasing popularity due to their relevance for many fundamental and applied scientific problems. They constitute soap bubbles and foams, serve as membranes for gas transport or as…
We demonstrate spontaneous wrinkling as a transient dynamical pattern in thin freely floating smectic liquid-crystalline films. The peculiarity of such films is that, while flowing liquid-like in the film plane, they cannot quickly expand…
The Brownian diffusion of micron-scale inclusions in freely suspended smectic A liquid crystal films a few nanometers thick and several millimeters in diameter depends strongly on the air surrounding the film. Near atmospheric pressure, the…
The coalescence of droplets plays a crucial role in nature and modern technology. Various experimental and theoretical studies explored droplet dynamics in 3D and on 2D solid or liquid substrates. In this paper, we demonstrate the…
We consider the feasibility of large-scale free-standing thin liquid film experiment in the space environment as a new realization to study two-dimensional hydrodynamics. We identify material and environmental criteria necessary to avoid…
Two dimensional (2D) laminar jet-----a stream of fluid that projected into a surrounding medium with the flow confined in 2D-----has both theoretical and experimental significance. We carried out 2D laminar jet experiments in freely…
Quasi-two-dimensional (quasi-2D) colloidal hard-sphere suspensions confined in a slit geometry are widely used as two dimensional (2D) model systems in experiments that probe the glassy relaxation dynamics of 2D systems. However, the…
A flux liquid can condense into a smectic crystal in a pure layered superconductor with the magnetic field oriented nearly parallel to the layers. Similar order can arise in low temperature $^4$He films with a highly anisotropic periodic…
Two-dimensional (2D) systems play a special role in many-body physics. Because of thermal fluctuations, they cannot undergo a conventional phase transition associated to the breaking of a continuous symmetry. Nevertheless they may exhibit a…
We report on a new experimental procedure for forming and studying polar smectic liquid crystal films. A free standing smectic film is put in contact with a liquid drop, so that the film has one liquid crystal/liquid interface and one…
We show that stable, freely suspended liquid crystal films can be made from the ferroelectric nematic ($\mathrm{N_F}$) phase and from the recently discovered polar, lamellar $\mathrm{SmZ_A}$ and $\mathrm{SmA_F}$ phases. The $\mathrm{N_F}$…
We study in this work the dynamics of a collection of identical hollow spheres (ping-pong balls) that rest on a horizontal metallic grid. Fluidization is achieved by means of a turbulent air current coming from below. The upflow is adjusted…
We study the hydrodynamics of a freely-standing smectic-A film in the isothermal, incompressible limit theoretically by analyzing the linearized hydrodynamic equations of motion with proper boundary conditions. The dynamic properties for…
Quasicrystals have been observed in a variety of materials ranging from metal alloys to block copolymers. However, their structural and dynamical properties cannot be readily described in terms of conventional solid-state models of liquids…
Smectic liquid crystals vividly illustrate the subtle interplay of broken translational and orientational symmetries, by exhibiting defect structures forming geometrically perfect confocal ellipses and hyperbolas. Here, we develop and…
Understanding the dynamics of liquid films that make up bubbles is of practical and fundamental importance. Practically, this understanding is crucial for tuning bubble stability, while fundamentally, thin films are an excellent platform to…
We analyze a solenoidal motion in a vertically vibrated freely suspended thin smectic film. We demonstrate analytically that transverse oscillations of the film generate two-dimensional vortices in the plane of the film owing to…