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Emergence of biaxiality in nematic liquid crystals with magnetic inclusions: Some theoretical insights

Aditya Vats1, Sanjay Puri2, and Varsha Banerjee1

  • 1Department of Physics, Indian Institute of Technology Delhi, New Delhi 110016, India
  • 2School of Physical Sciences, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi 110067, India

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Phys. Rev. E 106, 044701 – Published 14 October, 2022

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevE.106.044701

Abstract

The biaxial phase in nematic liquid crystals has been elusive for several decades after its prediction in the 1970s. A recent experimental breakthrough was achieved by Liu et al. [Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 113, 10479 (2016)] in a liquid-crystalline medium with magnetic nanoparticles. They exploited the different length scales of dipolar and magnetonematic interactions to obtain an equilibrium state where the magnetic moments are at an angle to the nematic director. This tilt introduces a second distinguished direction for orientational ordering or biaxiality in the two-component system. Using coarse-grained Ginzburg-Landau free-energy models for the nematic and magnetic fields, we provide a theoretical framework which allows for the manipulation of morphologies and quantitative estimates of biaxial order.

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Phys. Rev. E 106, 044701– Published 14 October, 2022
  • Received 4 March 2022
  • Accepted 2 September 2022
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