Related papers: Telephone-cord instabilities in thin smectic capil…
We develop a theory of point defects in cholesterics and textures in spherical droplets with normal anchoring. The local structure of chiral defects is described by singularity theory and a smectic-like gradient field establishing a nexus…
This article analyzes modulated phases in liquid crystals, from the long-established cholesteric and blue phases to the recently discovered twist-bend, splay-bend, and splay nematic phases, as well as the twist-grain-boundary (TGB) and…
Spontaneous symmetry breaking and emergent polar order are each of fundamental importance to a range of scientific disciplines, as well as generating rich phase behaviour in liquid crystals (LCs). Here, we show the union of these phenomena…
Recently, phonons with chirality (chiral phonons) have attracted significant attention. Chiral phonons exhibit angular and pseudo-angular momenta. In circularly polarized Raman spectroscopy, the peak split of the $\Gamma_3$ mode is…
The origin of recently observed spontaneous chiral symmetry breaking in polar fluids is an unsolved problem, and poses fundamental questions as to how heliconical structures emerge in systems composed of achiral molecules. We report on the…
Topological phases usually are unreachable in molecular solids, which are characteristic of weakly dispersed energy bands with a large gap, in contrast to topological materials. In this work, however, we propose that nontrivial electronic…
Chiral structures that produce asymmetric spin-phonon coupling can theoretically generate spin-phonon polarons -- quasiparticles exhibiting non-degenerate spin states with phonon displacements. These quasiparticles are speculated to be the…
Gradual disruption of the actin cytoskeleton induces a series of structural shape changes in cells leading to a transformation of cylindrical cell extensions into a periodic chain of "pearls". Quantitative measurements of the pearling…
Recent experiments on monolayers of spindle-like cells plated on adhesive stripe-shaped domains have provided a convincing demonstration that certain types of collective phenomena in epithelia are well described by active nematic…
Ferroelectric nematic (NF) phase and related polar liquid-crystalline phases form a new class of strongly polarized yet fluid soft matter. Well-recognized heliconical ferroelectric phases such as NTBF and SmC_P^H exist, but their…
Based on first-principles calculations we show that gold atoms can form both free-standing and tip-suspended chiral single-wall nanotubes composed of helical atomic strands. Free-standing, infinite (5,5) tube is found to be energetically…
Motivated by intertwined crystal symmetries and topological phases, we study the possible realization of topological insulator in nonsymmorphic crystals at integer fillings. In particular, we consider spin orbit coupled electronic systems…
We report the experimental investigations on a liquid crystal comprised of thiophene-based achiral bent-core banana shaped molecules. The results reveal the presence of a short range nematic phase at high temperatures and a long-range SmA…
A flux liquid can condense into a smectic crystal in a pure layered superconductors with the magnetic field oriented nearly parallel to the layers. If the smectic order is commensurate with the layering, this crystal is {\sl stable} to…
It is argued that topological disorder in amorphous solids can be described by local strains related to local reference crystals and local rotations. An intuitive localization criterion is formulated from this point of view. The Inverse…
We study the time-dependent formation and evolution of a current sheet (CS) in a magnetized, collisionless, high-beta plasma using hybrid-kinetic particle-in-cell simulations. An initially tearing-stable Harris sheet is frozen into a…
The notion that phonons can carry pseudo-angular momentum has become popular in the last decade, with recent research efforts highlighting phonon chirality, Berry curvature of phonon band structure, and the phonon Hall effect. When a phonon…
Recent experimental observations have demonstrated interesting instability phenomenon during thermal drawing of microstructured glass/polymer fibers, and these observations motivate us to examine surface-tension-driven instabilities in…
We analyze the polar Kerr effect in an itinerant electron system on a square lattice in the presence of a composite charge order proposed for the pseudogap state in underdoped cuprates. This composite charge order preserves discrete…
The fundamental instability responsible for the shear localization which results in shear bands in amorphous solids remains unknown despite enormous amount of research, both experimental and theoretical. As this is the main mechanism for…