Issue 16, 2020

Properties of surface Landau–de Gennes Q-tensor models

Abstract

Uniaxial nematic liquid crystals whose molecular orientation is subjected to tangential anchoring on a curved surface offer a non trivial interplay between the geometry and the topology of the surface and the orientational degree of freedom. We consider a general thin film limit of a Landau–de Gennes Q-tensor model which retains the characteristics of the 3D model. From this, previously proposed surface models follow as special cases. We compare fundamental properties, such as the alignment of the orientational degrees of freedom with principle curvature lines, order parameter symmetry and phase transition type for these models, and suggest experiments to identify suitable model assumptions.

Graphical abstract: Properties of surface Landau–de Gennes Q-tensor models

Article information

Article type
Paper
Submitted
18 Dec 2019
Accepted
16 Mar 2020
First published
09 Apr 2020
This article is Open Access
Creative Commons BY license

Soft Matter, 2020,16, 4032-4042

Properties of surface Landau–de Gennes Q-tensor models

M. Nestler, I. Nitschke, H. Löwen and A. Voigt, Soft Matter, 2020, 16, 4032 DOI: 10.1039/C9SM02475A

This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported Licence. You can use material from this article in other publications without requesting further permissions from the RSC, provided that the correct acknowledgement is given.

Read more about how to correctly acknowledge RSC content.

Social activity

Spotlight

Advertisements