Elastic response and Ward identities in stressed nematic elastomers.

Electro-mechanical coupling in nematic elastomers: statics and dynamics

SUMMARY. New analytical and computational results on the static and dynamic response of ne-matic elastomers to applied electric fields and mechanical loads are reviewed, and compared with the available experimental evidence. 1 INTRODUCTION Nematic elastomers display a peculiar mechanical response arising from the interplay between the electro-optical properties of liquid crystals and the elasti...

Soft Elastic Response of Stretched Sheets of Nematic Elastomers: a Numerical Study

Linear hydrodynamics and viscoelasticity of nematic elastomers

We develop a continuum theory of linear viscoelastic response in oriented monodomain nematic elastomers. The expression for dissipation function is analogous to the Leslie-Ericksen version of anisotropic nematic viscosity; we propose the relations between the anisotropic rubber moduli and new viscous coefficients. A new dimensionless number is introduced, which describes the relative magnitude ...

Modeling elastic instabilities in nematic elastomers.

Liquid crystal elastomers are cross-linked polymer networks covalently bonded with liquid crystal mesogens. In the nematic phase, due to strong coupling between mechanical strain and orientational order, these materials display strain-induced instabilities associated with formation and evolution of orientational domains. Using a three-dimensional finite element elastodynamics simulation, we inv...

Rotational invariance and Goldstone modes in nematic elastomers and gels

We investigate the symmetries of elastomers and gels cross-linked in a nematic state. The coupling between the local nematic order parameter and an applied deformation leads to a class of uniform deformations which cost no elastic energy, when accompanied by a given rotation of the nematic director; this is a specific realization of a class of soft modes originally proposed, on symmetry argumen...