Related papers: Nematic textures in spherical shells
We propose an extension of Frank-Oseen's elastic energy for bulk nematic liquid crystals which is based on the hypothesis that the fundamental deformations allowed in nematic liquid crystals are splay, twist and bend. The extended elastic…
The textures associated with a point defect centered in a circular domain of a thin film with XY-like ordering have been analyzed. The family of equilibrium textures, both stable and metastable, can be classified by a new radial topological…
The nonlinear elastic properties of nematic liquid crystals have acquired new interest with the recent experimental observation of bulk modulated nematic phases which are composed by achiral molecules. We extend the Oseen-Zocher-Frank's…
Free interfaces of liquid crystals tend to minimise both capillarity and anchoring forces. Here we study nematic films in planar and radial geometries with antagonistic anchoring boundary conditions and one deformable interface. Assuming a…
Most, but not all, liquid crystals tend to align when subject to shear flow, while most nematic polymeric liquid crystals undergo a tumbling instability, where the director rotate with the flow. The reasons of this instability remain…
Using simulations of hard rods in smectic-A states, we find non-gaussian diffusion and heterogeneous dynamics due to the equilibrium periodic smectic density profiles, which give rise to permanent barriers for layer-to-layer diffusion. This…
A nematic membrane is a sheet with embedded orientational order, which can occur in biological cells, liquid crystal films, manufactured materials, and other soft matter systems. By formulating the free energy of nematic films using tensor…
We consider a mathematical model that describes the flow of a Nematic Liquid Crystal (NLC) film placed on a flat substrate, across which a spatially-varying electric potential is applied. Due to their polar nature, NLC molecules interact…
Active turbulence in dense active systems is characterized by high vorticity on a length scale that is large compared to that of individual entities. We describe the properties of active turbulence as momentum propagation is screened by…
Using Landau-de Gennes effective theory for nematic liquid crystals we analyse the structure of rectilinear n=1/2 smooth disclination line in the case of equal elastic constants. We find that at certain temperature there is an exact…
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 $\mathrm{N_F}$…
A systematic analysis of defect textures in facetted nanoparticles with polygonal configurations embedded in a nematic matrix is performed using the Landau-de Gennes model, homeotropic strong anchoring in a square domain with uniform…
An individual defect in a nematic liquid crystal moves not only in response to its interaction with other defects but also in response to an external field. We analyze the motion of a wedge disclination in the presence of an applied field…
We formulate a theoretical model of the shear failure of a thin film tethered to a rigid substrate. The interface between film and substrate is modeled as a cohesive layer with randomly fluctuating shear strength/fracture energy. We…
The equilibrium phase space of magnetic textures in thin-films of cubic chiral ferromagnets, including skyrmions, is explored as a function of in-plane magnetic field strength, film thickness and uniaxial anisotropy. The interplay between…
We study the behaviour of a specific system of relativistic elasticity in its own gravitational field: a static, spherically symmetric shell whose wall is of arbitrary thickness consisting of hyperelastic material. We give the system of…
Ordinary nematic liquid crystals are characterized by having a uniform director field as ground state. In such a state, the director is the same everywhere and no distortion is to be seen at all. We give a definition of uniform distortion…
Nematic liquid crystals exhibit both crystal-like and fluid-like features. In particular, the propagation of an acoustic wave shows an unexpected occurrence of some of the solid-like features at the hydrodynamic level, namely, the…
We investigate a number of complex patterns driven by the electro-convection instability in a planarly aligned layer of a nematic liquid crystal. They are traced back to various secondary instabilities of the ideal roll patterns bifurcating…
We present a novel, self-consistent and robust theoretical model to investigate elastic interactions between topological defects in liquid crystal shells. Accounting for the non-concentric nature of the shell in a simple manner, we are able…