The nematic liquid crystal phase is a phase of matter in which the particles have a preferred orientational direction, as opposed to the liquid phase, with no preferred direction, and the solid crystal phase, with an ordered lattice structure. In an aggregated dye, or chromonic, liquid crystal, molecules aggregate together, and the aggregates form a liquid crystal. Aggregated dyes that form liq...

Close to sinusoidal substrates, simple fluids may undergo a filling transition, in which the fluid passes from a dry to a filled state, where the interface remains unbent but bound to the substrate. Increasing the surface field, the interface unbinds and a wetting transition occurs. We show that this double-transition sequence may be strongly modified in the case of ordered fluids, such as nema...

A liquid crystal polymer (LCP) self-assembled on a photoirradiated substrate can modify the viscoelastic response of liquid crystal medium on the substrate. Sum-frequency vibrational spectroscopy shows that the phenyl groups of LCP are oriented epitaxially with layer thickness and an in-plane alignment order much higher than that at the photoirradiated surface can be yielded. The liquid crystal...

This work demonstrates a novel broadband optical switch, based on dynamic-scattering effect in liquid crystals (LCs). Dynamic-scattering-mode technology was developed for display applications over four decades ago, but was displaced in favor of the twisted-nematic LCs. However, with the recent development of more stable LCs, dynamic scattering provides advantages over other technologies for opt...

It is shown that, for proper symmetry of the parent lattice, antiferromagnetic order can survive in two-dimensional liquid crystals and even isotropic liquids of pointlike particles, in contradiction to what common sense might suggest. We discuss the requirements for antiferromagnetic order in the absence of translational and/or orientational lattice order. One example is the honeycomb lattice,...

A brief introduction of liquid crystals and their phases is provided in this paper. Liquid crystal is a state of matter which has intermediate prosperities between liquid and crystalline solid. Its phases are characterized by their space and point group symmetry. We'll give a description of the symmetry and characteristics of different phase types of liquid crystals. And then talk about their p...

We observe a surprisingly general power law decay at short to intermediate times in orientational relaxation in a variety of model systems (both calamitic and discotic, and also lattice) for thermotropic liquid crystals. As all these systems transit across the isotropic-nematic phase boundary, two power law relaxation regimes, separated by a plateau, emerge, giving rise to a steplike feature (w...

The photorefractivity of a photorefractive composite consisting of poly(N-vinylcarbazole) (PVK) doped with a non-room-temperature liquid crystal, 4-butyloxy4’-cyanobiphenyl (4OCB), and C60 was studied by means of measuring the two-beam coupling coefficients. The results show that the photorefractivity is enhanced by phase separation. PACS: 42.65; 61.30; 61.40 Interest in materials that exhibit ...

The dynamics of glass is of importance in materials science but its nature has not yet been fully understood. Here we report that a verification of the temperature dependencies of the primary relaxation time or viscosity in the ultraslowing/ultraviscous domain of glass-forming systems can be carried out via the analysis of the inverse of the Dyre-Olsen temperature index. The subsequent analysis...