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Related papers: Shape Morphing of Planar Liquid Crystal Elastomers

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Engineering synthetic materials that mimic the remarkable complexity of living organisms is a fundamental challenge in science and technology. We study the spatiotemporal patterns that emerge when an active nematicfilm of microtubules and…

Curved particles have been shown to stabilize a range of states with unique order in dense suspensions of colloidal bent core liquid crystals. The shape of the colloidal rods encourages the formation of curved director fields. However,…

Soft Condensed Matter · Physics 2026-01-08 Nicholas W. Hackney , Joel T. Clemmer , Gary S. Grest

Mechanical metamaterials leverage geometric design to achieve unconventional properties, such as high strength at low density, efficient wave guiding, and complex shape morphing. The ability to control shape changes builds on the complex…

Applied Physics · Physics 2025-01-28 Krzysztof K. Dudek , Muamer Kadic , Corentin Coulais , Katia Bertoldi

We investigate experimentally the dynamic phase transition of a two-dimensional active nematic layer interfaced with a passive liquid crystal. Under a temperature ramp that leads to the transition of the passive liquid into a highly…

Addressing the intricate challenges in plane elasticity, especially with non-vanishing traction and complex geometries, requires innovative methods. This paper offers a novel approach, drawing inspiration from the Neumann problem for the…

Materials Science · Physics 2025-04-09 Andreas Granath , Per Åhag , Antti Perälä , Rafał Czyż

We have studied the nucleation and the physical properties of a -1/2 wedge disclination line near the free surface of a confined nematic liquid crystal. The position of the disclination line has been related to the material parameters…

Soft Condensed Matter · Physics 2009-10-31 Jordi Ignes-Mullol , Jean Baudry , Lubor Lejcek , Patrick Oswald

Much recent progress has been made in the study of nematic solids, both glassy and elastomeric, particularly in the realm of stress-free, defect-driven deformation in thin sheets of material. In this paper we consider a subset of texture…

Soft Condensed Matter · Physics 2013-02-11 Carl D. Modes , Mark Warner

We give a description of the intrinsic geometry of elastic distortions in three-dimensional nematic liquid crystals and establish necessary and sufficient conditions for a set of functions to represent these distortions by describing how…

Soft Condensed Matter · Physics 2021-06-28 Joseph Pollard , Gareth P. Alexander

In this article, we construct and analyze models of anisotropic crosslinked polymers employing tools from the theory of liquid crystal elastomers. The anisotropy of these systems stems from the presence of rigid-rod molecular units in the…

Analysis of PDEs · Mathematics 2013-03-26 M. Carme Calderer , Carlos A. Garavito , Chong Luo

Liquid crystal networks combine the orientational order of liquid crystals with the elastic properties of polymer networks, leading to a vast application potential in the field of responsive coatings, e.g., for haptic feedback,…

Soft Condensed Matter · Physics 2020-10-28 Guido L. A. Kusters , Inge P. Verheul , Nicholas B. Tito , Paul van der Schoot , Cornelis Storm

Considerable recent attention has been given to the study of shape formation using modern responsive materials that can be preprogrammed to undergo spatially inhomogeneous local deformations. In particular, nematic liquid crystal polymer…

Soft Condensed Matter · Physics 2016-09-28 Cyrus Mostajeran , Taylor H. Ware , Timothy J. White

We consider nematic liquid crystals in a bounded, convex polyhedron described by a director field n(r) subject to tangent boundary conditions. We derive lower bounds for the one-constant elastic energy in terms of topological invariants.…

Mathematical Physics · Physics 2009-11-10 A Majumdar , JM Robbins , M Zyskin

A theory of mechanical behaviour of the magneto-sensitive elastomers is developed in the framework of a linear elasticity approach. Using a regular rectangular lattice model, different spatial distributions of magnetic particles within a…

Soft Condensed Matter · Physics 2011-07-15 D. Ivaneyko , V. Toshchevikov , M. Saphiannikova , G. Heinrich

After a brief introduction to several variational problems in the study of shapes of thin thickness structures, we deal with variational problems on 2-dimensional surface in 3-dimensional Euclidian space by using exterior differential…

Mathematical Physics · Physics 2007-05-23 Z. C. Tu , Z. C. Ou-Yang

We demonstrate a variety of ordered patterns, including hexagonal structures and chains, formed by colloidal particles (droplets) at the free surface of a nematic liquid crystal (LC). The surface placement introduces a new type of particle…

Soft Condensed Matter · Physics 2009-11-10 I. I. Smalyukh , S. Chernyshuk , B. I. Lev , A. B. Nych , U. Ognysta , V. G. Nazarenko , O. D. Lavrentovich

Solid materials are commonly classified as crystalline or amorphous based on the presence or absence of long-range order.Metal-organic frameworks (MOFs), like other solids,also display markedly different properties and functions in these…

Deformable object manipulation tasks have long been regarded as challenging robotic problems. However, until recently very little work has been done on the subject, with most robotic manipulation methods being developed for rigid objects.…

Robotics · Computer Science 2022-08-04 Rita Laezza , Yiannis Karayiannidis

We theoretically investigate the threshold for the director reorientation from the homeotropic state to the hybrid homeotropic-planar state and vice versa in a cell filled with a flexoelectric nematic liquid crystal (NLC) subjected to an…

Soft Condensed Matter · Physics 2021-03-30 O. S. Tarnavskyy , M. F. Ledney

A promising approach in designing composite materials with unusual physical behavior combines solid nanostructures and orientationally ordered soft matter at the mesoscale. Such composites not only inherit properties of their constituents…

Soft Condensed Matter · Physics 2017-01-19 Andrew J. Hess , Qingkun Liu , Ivan I. Smalyukh

We study stability and distortions of liquid crystal nematic order in a cell with a random heterogeneous substrate. Modeling this system as a bulk xy model with quenched disorder confined to a surface, we find that nematic order is…

Soft Condensed Matter · Physics 2010-05-05 Quan Zhang , Leo Radzihovsky