Related papers: Stabilising the Blue Phases
We develop a Landau theory for bend flexoelectricity in liquid crystals of bent-core molecules. In the nematic phase of the model, the bend flexoelectric coefficient increases as we reduce the temperature toward the nematic to polar phase…
In liquid crystals, if flexoelectric couplings between polar order and director gradients are strong enough, the uniform nematic phase can become unstable to formation of a modulated polar phase. Previous theories have predicted two types…
We report large scale simulations of the blue phases of cholesteric liquid crystals. Our results suggest a structure for blue phase III, the blue fog, which has been the subject of a long debate in liquid crystal physics. We propose that…
In this work, we study the nematic-isotropic phase transition based on the dynamics of the Landau--De Gennes theory of liquid crystals. At the critical temperature, the Landau--De Gennes bulk potential favors the isotropic phase and nematic…
The cubic blue phases of liquid crystals are fascinating and technologically promising examples of hierarchically structured soft materials, comprising ordered networks of defect lines (disclinations) within a liquid crystalline matrix. We…
Blue phases are networks of disclination lines, which occur in cholesteric liquid crystals near the transition to the isotropic phase. They have recently been used for the new generation of fast switching liquid crystal displays. Here we…
For decades now, low-energy models of QCD have shown indications that a crystalline quark phase could be stable at high chemical potentials. Beyond models, however, there are numerous difficulties in investigating such a hypothesis in full…
We numerically investigate the phase behavior of thick shells of cholesteric liquid crystals with tangential anchoring at the shell boundary. For achiral liquid crystal, we demonstrate a thickness-dependent transition from a configuration…
We use full nematohydrodynamic simulations to study the statics and dynamics of monolayers of cholesteric liquid crystals. Using chirality and temperature as control parameters we show that we can recover the two-dimensional blue phases…
We use lattice Boltzmann simulations to solve the Beris-Edwards equations of motion for a cholesteric liquid crystal subjected to Poiseuille flow along the direction of the helical axis (permeative flow). The results allow us to clarify and…
We study the effects of colloidal nanoparticles (NPs) in liquid crystal samples in the dilute limit, in a Landau--de Gennes theoretical framework. The effects of the suspended NPs are captured by a homogenized energy, as outlined…
We study nematic configurations within three-dimensional (3D) cuboids, with planar degenerate boundary conditions on the cuboid faces, in the Landau-de Gennes framework. There are two geometry-dependent variables: the edge length of the…
Elastic matrix distortion around a growing inclusion of a new phase is analyzed and the associated contribution to the Gibbs free energy is considered. The constant-composition transformation from the parent to product phase is considered…
We present computer simulations of the response of a flexoelectric blue phase network, either in bulk or under confinement, to an applied field. We find a transition in the bulk between the blue phase I disclination network and a parallel…
We propose a model of directed lines where the average direction has the nature of a cholesteric liquid crystal. This model, for instance, would describe the liquid of screw dislocations in the twist-grain-boundary (TGB) phase of liquid…
We present an effective elastic theory which {\em quantitatively} describes the stripe phase of the two-dimensional electron gas in high Landau levels ($N\geq2$). The dynamical matrix is obtained with remarkably high precision from the…
In this paper we examine the modelling and minimisation of cholesteric liquid crystals systems within the Oseen-Frank theory. We focus on a cuboid domain with the frustrated boundary conditions ${\bf n}(0,x,y)=(1,0,0)$ and ${\bf…
A model predicting the structure of repulsive, spherically symmetric, monodisperse particles confined between two walls is presented. We study the buckling transition of a single flat layer as the double layer state develops. Experimental…
We demonstrate that a first order isotropic-to-nematic phase transition in liquid crystals can be succesfully modeled within the generalized Landau-de Gennes theory by selecting an appropriate combination of elastic constants. The numerical…
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…