相关论文: Liquid Crystal Distortions Revealed by an Octupola…

The topology and the geometry of a surface play a fundamental role in determining the equilibrium configurations of thin films of liquid crystals. We propose here a theoretical analysis of a recently introduced surface Frank energy, in the…

This paper aims to provide an introduction to a basic form of the ${\bf Q}$-tensor approach to modelling liquid crystals, which has seen increased interest in recent years. The increase in interest in this type of modelling approach has…

Liquid crystals are known for their optical birefringence, a property that gives rise to intricate patterns and colors when viewed in a microscope between crossed polarisers. Resulting images are rich in geometric patterns and serve as…

Liquid crystal elastomers represent a novel class of programmable shape-transforming materials whose shape change trajectory is encoded in the material's nematic director field. Using three-dimensional nonlinear finite element…

We propose a theoretical framework to predict the three-dimensional shapes of optically deformed micron-sized emulsion droplets with ultra-low interfacial tension. The resulting shape and size of the droplet arises out of a balance between…

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…

The recent progress towards production of near-ground state quantum-degenerate molecules raises the issue of how such "small" molecules behave in an optical lattice. In this Letter we show that the coupling of the molecular orientation to…

Statistical theory of the dielectric susceptibility of polar liquid crystals is proposed. The molecules are not uniaxial but similar to cones. It is assumed that the permanent dipole moment of a molecule is parallel to the axis of the…

When submitted to large stresses at high temperature, usual crystals may irreversibly deform. This phenomenon is known as plasticity and it is due to the motion of crystal defects such as dislocations. We have discovered that, in the…

Glasses are ubiquitous amorphous solids that remain one of the big mysteries in condensed matter. Despite the vast body of literature on glasses, a unifying approach to link the structure and dynamics of glasses is still missing. A growing…

An accurate description of a columnar liquid crystal of hard disks at high packing fractions is presented using an improved free-volume theory. It is shown that the orientational entropy of the disks in the one-dimensional fluid direction…

We develop the elastic theory for inversion-asymmetric tethered membranes and use it to identify and study their possible phases. Asymmetry in a tethered membrane causes spontaneous curvature, which in general depends upon the local…

A nonlinear optical medium results by the collective orientation of liquid crystal molecules tightly coupled to a transparent photoconductive layer. We show that such a medium can give a large gain, thus, if inserted in a ring cavity, it…

In amorphous materials, plasticity is localized and occurs as shear transformations. It was recently shown by Wu et al. that these shear transformations can be predicted by applying topological defect concepts developed for liquid crystals…

The phase-ordering kinetics of a bulk uniaxial nematic liquid crystal is addressed using techniques that have been successfully applied to describe ordering in the O(n) model. The method involves constructing an appropriate mapping between…

Understanding and controlling the director field configuration, shape, and orientation in nematic and cholesteric liquid crystals is of fundamental importance in several branches of science. Liquid crystalline droplets, also known as…

This chapter is about the modeling of nematic liquid crystals (LCs) and their numerical simulation. We begin with an overview of the basic physics of LCs and discuss some of their many applications. Next, we delve into the modeling…

The deviation of positions of atoms from their ideal lattice sites in crystalline solid state systems causes distortion and can lead to variation in structural [1] and functional properties [2]. Distortion in molecular systems has been…

Widely known for their uses in displays and electro-optics, liquid crystals are more than just technological marvels. They vividly reveal the topology and structure of various solitonic and singular field configurations, often markedly…

Opals are naturally occurring photonic crystals which can be formed easily using low-cost self-assembly methods. While the optical behaviour of opals has received significant attention over the last number of decades, there is limited…