The Effect of the Degree of Polymerization and Polymer Composition on the Temperature Responsiveness of Cholesteric Semi-Interpenetrating Networks

Cholesteric liquid crystal oligomers and polymers are promising materials for creating devices with stimuli-responsive structural color, the cholesteric to smectic pre-transition effect is of particular interest as it leads a strong redshift in reflected color upon cooling. can be stabilized by formation semi-interpenetrating networks obtain more robust photonic materials, but this tends strongly suppress effect. Here, we show that based on main-chain amplified incorporating monomer increasing degree polymerization oligomers. This amplification counteracts suppressing network, resulting still significant band shift Presumably, both methods lead domains helix, which causes an pre-transitional The results bring us closer use applications smart sensing, healthcare, safety devices.