Alignment of nematic liquid crystals on mixed Langmuir–Blodgett monolayers

Monolayers of stearic and behenic acids and mixtures of them in different proportions, deposited with the Langmuir–Blodgett (LB) technique, were used to study the alignment and the alignment dynamics in nematic liquid crystal cells. A relaxation process from a splay-bend flow-induced metastable orie...

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Bibliographic Details
Published inThin solid films Vol. 327; pp. 681 - 685
Main Authors Fazio, V.S.U, Komitov, L, Lagerwall, S.T
Format Journal Article
LanguageEnglish
Published Elsevier B.V 31.08.1998
Subjects
Anchoring
Homeotropic alignment
Langmuir–Blodgett monolayer
Mixed monolayer
Nematic liquid crystal
Mixed monolayer
Langmuir–Blodgett monolayer
Homeotropic alignment
Nematic liquid crystal
Anchoring
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Summary:Monolayers of stearic and behenic acids and mixtures of them in different proportions, deposited with the Langmuir–Blodgett (LB) technique, were used to study the alignment and the alignment dynamics in nematic liquid crystal cells. A relaxation process from a splay-bend flow-induced metastable orientation to the homeotropic one occurs. The lifetime of the metastable state was found to depend on the monolayer composition. The transition between the homeotropic and the conical anchoring was found to be irreversible in the case of the mixed aligning monolayers: on cooling from the isotropic phase a quasi-planar nematic state (schlieren texture) appears. It is stable in a range of a few degrees below the clearing point and, on decreasing the temperature, relaxes to the homeotropic state in the form of expanding domains.
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ISSN:0040-6090
1879-2731
DOI:10.1016/S0040-6090(98)00740-8