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- Title
Qualitatively and Quantitatively Different Configurations of Nematic–Nanoparticle Mixtures.
- Authors
Zid, Maha; Pal, Kaushik; Harkai, Saša; Abina, Andreja; Kralj, Samo; Zidanšek, Aleksander
- Abstract
We consider the influence of different nanoparticles or micrometre-scale colloidal objects, which we commonly refer to as particles, on liquid crystalline (LC) orientational order in essentially spatially homogeneous particle–LC mixtures. We first illustrate the effects of coupling a single particle with the surrounding nematic molecular field. A particle could either act as a "dilution", i.e., weakly distorting local effective orientational field, or as a source of strong distortions. In the strong anchoring limit, particles could effectively act as topological point defects, whose topological charge q depends on particle topology. The most common particles exhibit spherical topology and consequently act as q = 1 monopoles. Depending on the particle's geometry, these effective monopoles could locally induce either point-like or line-like defects in the surrounding LC host so that the total topological charge of the system equals zero. The resulting system's configuration is topologically equivalent to a crystal-like array of monopole defects with alternating topological charges. Such configurations could be trapped in metastable or stable configurations, where the history of the sample determines a configuration selection.
- Subjects
POINT defects; NEMATIC liquid crystals
- Publication
Nanomaterials (2079-4991), 2024, Vol 14, Issue 5, p436
- ISSN
2079-4991
- Publication type
Article
- DOI
10.3390/nano14050436