Quasi-Stationary States in Ionic Liquid-Liquid Crystal Mixtures at the Nematic-Isotropic Phase Transition

Nematic-isotropic phase transition in a liquid-crystal droplet.

Possible phases in a nematic liquid crystal confined to a spherical submicrometer droplet embedded in a solid polymer are analyzed in terms of a Landau — de Gennes theory. For a droplet with a radial structure we show that the strength of the nematic-polymer interfacial interaction affects the nematic-paranematic (partially ordered isotropic phase) phase transition and may in addition induce a ...

Magnetic-field induced isotropic to nematic liquid crystal phase transition.

We report on measurements of magnetic-field induced nematic order in the bent-core liquid crystal 4-chlororesorcinol bis[4-(4-n-dodecyloxybenzoyloxy) benzoate]. Using the 31 T solenoid at the National High Magnetic Field Laboratory, we have observed, at temperatures less than 1 degrees above the clearing point, a first-order transition to the nematic phase. The critical magnetic field at which ...

Investigation into the temperature dependence of isotropic- nematic phase transition of Gay- Berne liquid crystals

Density functional approach was used to study the isotropic- nematic (I-N) transition and calculate the values of freezing parameters of the Gay- Berne liquid crystal model. New direct and pair correlation functions of a molecular fluid with Gay- Berne pair potential were used. These new functions were used in density functional theory as input to calculate the isotropic- nematic transition den...

Critical behavior at the isotropic-to-nematic phase transition in a bent-core liquid crystal.

Magnetic birefringence and dynamic light scattering measurements of orientational order parameter fluctuations at the isotropic-nematic phase transition of a bent-core liquid crystal reveal a pretransitional temperature dependence consistent with the standard Landau-deGennes mean field theory. However, as follows: the transition in the bent-core compound is more weakly first order (TNI-T* appro...

Continuous nematic-isotropic transition in submicron-size liquid-crystal droplets.