Unusual thickness-dependent thermal behavior and anticlinic coupling in chiral smectic free-standing liquid-crystal films

We observe, in free-standing films of a chiral smectic liquid crystal, a series of discrete transitions in the relative orientation of the tilt of the interior and surface layers. These transitions include a remarkable reentrant synclinic-anticlinic-synclinic ordering sequence of the film surfaces in the presence of an electric field upon cooling. The profiles of the associated heat-capacity anomalies are found to be strongly thickness dependent and exhibit a novel crossover behavior in reduced dimensions. We measure the anticlinic coupling between tilted surface layers in the smectic- A phase.     

X-ray photoelectron and auger spectroscopy analysis of Ge:Mn-based magnetic semiconductor layers

Thin (～60 nm) germanium layers supersaturated with a manganese impurity of 10–16 at % have been studied by x-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) and Auger electron spectroscopy (AES). The layers have been fabricated by pulsed laser deposition onto a semi-insulating single-crystal GaAs substrate. The results of XPS analysis of the Ge:Mn layers reveal a change in the line shape of germanium and manganese (2p) in the surface region compared to deeper layers, which indicates a transition from the oxidized form of the base material (Ge²⁺ and Ge¹⁺) and impurity (Mn²⁺) near the surface to the unoxidized state of germanium (Ge ⁰) and manganese (Mn⁰) in the interior of the layer. The XPS spectra of the valence electrons of the Ge:Mn structure indicate that the density of states in the valence band of the ferromagnetic Ge:Mn structures is caused not only by mechanical mixing of germanium and manganese. The composition of heterogeneous inclusions in Ge:Mn films has been studied using scanning Auger microscopy.     

Tilted and helical columnar phases for an axially symmetric discoidal system

We report novel phase behavior for a system of disclike ellipsoidal particles interacting via a pair potential. We identify a structural phase transition between two hexagonal columnar phases, both tilted, induced by spatial ordering of the tilt about the columnar axis and positional correlations between neighboring columns upon cooling. The local minima of the potential energy surface support irregular helical arrangements of the discoids about the columnar axis for the high-temperature hexagonal columnar phase, and a tilted arrangement for both phases. Our study demonstrates that dispersion-repulsion forces corresponding to oblate ellipsoids are sufficient to produce a columnar phase that is tilted and helical.     

Thermal and dielectric studies of self-assembly systems formed by hydroquinone and alkyloxy benzoic acids

Self-assembly systems formed by hydroquinone and alkyloxy benzoic acids are isolated and characterized. Hydroquinone formed double hydrogen bonds with p-n-alkyloxy benzoic acids. Various hydrogen bonded complexes have been synthesized with hydroquinone and pentyloxy to dodecyloxy benzoic acid, respectively. FTIR studies confirm the hydrogen bond formation in the complex. Polarizing Optical Microscopic (POM) studies revealed the textural information while the transition and enthalpy values are experimentally deduced from Differential Scanning Calorimetry (DSC) studies. Phase diagram has been constructed from the POM and DSC data. The members of the present homologous complexes are characterized by POM, DSC, optical tilt angle and dielectric studies. Odd-even effect has been evinced in enthalpy values and transition temperatures corresponding to the isotropic to nematic phase transition. Optical tilt angle in Smectic C phase data has been fitted to a power law and it has been observed that the temperature variation of the tilt angle follows Mean Field theory prediction. Results of Fourier Transform Infrared Spectra (FTIR), POM, DSC, tilt angle and dielectric studies are discussed.     

Tilted smectic layers of a liquid crystal between homeotropically treated plates

We investigated SmC^* films sandwiched between silane coated glass plates and observed formation of textures exhibiting a uniform tilt of the smectic layers with respect to the boundary plates. The layer tilt angle increases from zero to as the sample is cooled from the smectic A phase to room temperature. These films show linear electro-optical effects because the permanent polarization can be aligned so that it has a component parallel to the applied field without changing the layer structure. Our analysis indicates that mainly two effects determine the layer tilt. On the one hand, the surface tension tends to minimise the layer tilt. On the other hand, the surface energy promotes the director to be normal to the boundary plates. Received 17 July 1998     

ON THE SATURATION BEHAVIOUR OF TWISTED NEMATIC LIQUID CRYSTAL CELLS WITH A NONZERO PRETILT ANGLE

Equations are obtained for the surface tilt angle and the twist angle of the director in a twisted nematic liquid crystal cell under a high magnetic field. Under a zero pretilt angle, the two equations reduce to those obtained by Sugimura et al. This fact has also been demonstrated numerically. With finite field strength and nonzero pretilt angle, no saturation transition exists.     

Two-stage crystallization on the surface of smectic nanofilms

The influence of the surface and finite size on crystallization in nanofilms of a smectic C liquid crystal with thicknesses between two and several tens of molecular layers has been studied. Transitions in a single surface molecular layer have been detected by optical methods. It has been found that transitions on the film surface take place at a temperature 8°C higher than the crystallization temperature in a bulk sample. Two-stage crystallization has been detected in surface layers where the surface induces a transition to an intermediate structure different from the structure of the phases of the bulk sample.     

Surface contouring by phase-shifting digital holography

Surface contouring by phase-shifting digital holography is proposed that provides surface height from a change of reconstructed object phases due to the tilt of object illumination. Surface height from a reference plane is directly obtained from the phase change. Its sensitivity depends on the tilt angle as well as on the initial incident angle. By proper selection of the angles we can derive surface height without phase unwrapping. The sensitivity can be enhanced by increasing the tilt angle. Then we need phase unwrapping that is sensitive to noise due to laser speckles in the reconstructed images. This noise could be suppressed by selecting phase values at points of the maximum product of amplitudes before and after the illumination change in the course of data reduction from 1024×1024 to 512×512 and by selecting paths for phase unwrapping by looking for the intensity maximum. The observed height resolution is 20 μm. Effects of numerical focusing have also been investigated. The present method has the same sensitivity as the fringe projection method, but it has larger measurement depth and is also applicable to the deformation measurement with the same arrangement.     

Studies of pulsed laser melting and rapid solidification using amorphous silicon

Pulsed laser melting of ion implantation-amorphized silicon layers, and the subsequent solidification of undercooled liquid silicon, have been studied experimentally and theoretically. Measurements of the time of the onset of melting of amorphous silicon layers, during an incident laser pulse, have been combined with measurements of the duration of melting, and with modified melting model calculations to demonstrate that the thermal conductivity, K_a, of amorphous silicon is very low (K_a0.02 W/cm K). K_a is also found to be the dominant parameter determining the dynamical response of amorphous silicon to pulsed laser radiation; the latent heat of fusion and melting temperature of amorphous silicon are relatively unimportant. Transmission electron microscopy indicates that bulk (volume) nucleation occurs directly from the highly undercooled liquid silicon that can be prepared by pulsed laser melting of amorphous silicon layers at low laser energy densities. A modified thermal melting model has been constructed to simulate this effect and is presented. Nucleation of crystalline silicon apparently occurs at a nucleation temperature, T_n, that is higher than the temperature, T_a, of the liquid-to-amorphous phase transition. The model calculations demonstrate that the release of latent heat by bulk nucleation occurring during the melt-in process is essential to obtaining agreement with experimentally observed depths of melting. These calculations also show that this release of latent heat accompanying bulk nucleation can result in the existence of buried molten layers of silicon in the interior of the sample after the surface has solidified. It is pointed out that the occurrence of bulk nucleation implies that the liquid-to-amorphous phase transition (produced using picosecond or ultraviolet nanosecond laser pulses) cannot be explained by purely thermodynamic considerations.     

Field-temperature phase diagrams in chiral tilted smectics,evidencing ferroelectric and ferrielectric phases

Usual ferroelectric compounds undergo a paraelectric-to-ferroelectric phase transition when the susceptibility of the electric polarization density changes its sign. The temperature is the only thermodynamic field that governs the phase transition. Chiral tilted smectics may also present an improper ferroelectricity when there is a tilt angle between the average long axis direction and the layer normal. The tilt angle is the order parameter of the phase transition which is governed by the temperature. Although the electric susceptibility remains positive, a polarization proportional to the tilt appears due to their linear coupling allowed by the chiral symmetry. Further complications come in when the chirality increases, as new phases are encountered with the same tilt inside the layers but a distribution of the azimuthal direction which is periodic with a unit cell of two (SmC(A)*, three (SmC(Fi1)*, four (SmC(Fi2)* or more (SmC(alpha)* layers. In most of these phases, the layer normal is a symmetry axis so there is no macroscopic polarization except for the SmC(Fi1)* in which the average long axis is tilted so the phase is ferrielectric. By studying a particular compound with only a SmC(Fi2)* and a SmC(alpha)* phase, we show that we recover the uniformly tilted ferroelectric SmC* when applying an electric field. We are thus led to build field-temperature phase diagrams for this class of compounds by combining different experimental techniques described here.     

Instabilities of thermocapillary-buoyancy convection in open rectangular liquid layers

This article presents the experimental investigation on instabilities of thermocapillary-buoyancy convection in the transition process in an open rectangular liquid layer subject to a horizontal temperature gradient. In the experimental run,an infrared thermal imaging system was constructed to observe and record the surface wave of the rectangular liquid layer. It was found that there are distinct convection longitudinal rolls in the flow field in the thermocapillary-buoyancy convection transition process. There are different wave characterizations for liquid layers with different thicknesses. For sufficiently thin layers, oblique hydrothermal waves are observed, which was predicted by the linear-stability analysis of Smith Davis in 1983. For thicker layers, the surface flow is distinct and intensified, which is because the buoyancy convection plays a dominant role and bulk fluid flow from hot wall to cold wall in the free surface of liquid layers. In addition, the spatiotemporal evolution analysis has been carried out to conclude the rule of the temperature field destabilization in the transition process.     

Phase transition to anticlinic texture in free-standing smectic c films

Experimental data on the optical reflectance of free-standing smectic C films were analyzed within the framework of a phenomenological Landau approach. At a certain temperature T _0N (determined from experimental data), which exceeds the known temperature T _c of the volume phase transition from smectic A to smectic C state, a surface phase transition takes place whereby molecules in the surface layer become sloped relative to the normal of the smectic layers. The transition temperatures T _0N ^s,a for N-layer films possessing synclinic (symmetric) and anticlinic (antisymmetric) textures of the order parameter (tilt angle θ) were determined. A comparison of the theoretical and experimental data allowed all parameters of the model to be determined (including critical indices of the correlation length and the surface order parameter). Three possible models of the transition from the state with transverse polarization (perpendicular to the molecular tilt plane) to the state with longitudinal polarization (parallel to this plane) are analyzed. The transition takes place at low (°–°) values of the order parameter θ in the middle layer of the film.     

Orientational order in CO and N2 monolayers on graphite studied by X-ray diffraction

X-ray diffraction has been used to study the structure and orientational phase transitions of CO and N₂ adsorbed on graphite (Papyex). Both form orientationally ordered 2√3 × 2√3 R30° commensurate phases on graphite at low temperatures (10 K). The in-plane herringbone structure of N₂ has been confirmed but CO has more orientational disorder than N₂, which may be associated either with tilting, random static or systematic, of the molecules away from the surface and/or with orientational order of shorter range than the centre of mass order. In the first case the average tilt would have to be about 26° and in the second case the orientational correlation length would have to be 200 Å compared with 450 Å for the translational order. The orientational phase transition is sharp for N₂, occurring over the range 27–30 K, in agreement with previous work. For CO the transition is broad and starts at lower temperatures. This and the structural data indicate that a point quadrupolar interaction is not a suitable model for comparing the properties of N₂ and CO layers. The orientational phase transition in the incommensurate phase of N₂ is found to be broad and occurs below 20 K. For CO it is sharper than for the commensurate phase and occurs at a higher temperature. The lattice parameter changes by 0.75% across the orientational phase transition. For both N₂ and CO there is evidence of translational disorder in the commensurate phases but it cannot be interpreted quantitatively.     

Au纳米薄膜的熔化机理及其结构演变的分子动力学模拟

利用分子动力学模拟详细研究了不同厚度的Au纳米薄膜的熔化机理和结构演变. 模拟结果表明所有Au纳米薄膜的熔化行为分为两个阶段,即表面预熔和均相熔化. 只有最外层原子出现了预熔化行为, 其他内层原子在均相熔化之前始终保持稳定的固态,这与零维的Au纳米团簇和一维的Au纳米线的预熔化行为是不同的. 同时Au纳米薄膜的熔化温度随着薄膜厚度的增加而升高. 在预熔化过程中,在原子水平上发现了所有的Au纳米薄膜的f100g晶面向f111g晶面转变的表面重建过程. 对于最薄的L2纳米薄膜,当温度低于500 K 时表面应力不能诱导这样的表面重建. 然而一维的Au纳米线在更低温度下就能够观察到了由表面应力诱导的表面重建过程. 这主要是因为Au纳米线具有更高的比表面积所导致的. 另外研究结果还表明当模拟温度达到某一特定值时,由双原子层组成的Au纳米薄膜能够分裂成一维的纳米线.     

Color centers and dynamic emission of Eu2+ ion doped halosilicate Ca10Si6O21Cl2

The structural and morphological properties of metal-organic chemical vapor deposition (MOCVD)-grown InGaN/GaN light-emitting diode (LED) structures with different In content have been studied by high-resolution X-ray diffraction (HRXRD), atomic force microscopy (AFM), Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR), and Photoluminescence (PL). It is found that the tilt and twist angles, lateral and vertical coherence lengths (CLs) of mosaic blocks, grain size, screw and edge dislocation densities of GaN and AlN layers, and surface roughness monotonically vary with In content. Experimental results show that the mosaic block dimensions for every two layers generally increase with increasing In content, with exception of the lateral CL of the GaN layer, which exhibits an inverse behavior. In this case, the strain values and tilt angles show a decrease accordingly. At the same time, the screw dislocation densities and twist angles of the GaN and AlN layers decrease and increase monotonically, respectively. The edge dislocation density of AlN shows a decreasing behavior, while that of the GaN exhibits an increasing trend. Furthermore, LED structures display an island-like surface structure at a relatively high In composition, in contrast to a well-defined step-terrace structure at a low In composition.     

Computation of the strain field generated by dislocations with a position-dependent Burgers' vector distribution

A new phenomenon of strain relaxation will be presented. In a series of InxGa1-xAs graded composition buffer layers grown on well cut (001) GaAs substrates, a curvature of the epilayer lattice has been found, i.e. a tilt of the epilayer lattice orientation with respect to the substrate which varies coherently along the sample surface on the scale of several mm. The most recent data analysis performed on a buffer layer compositionally graded with a six-step profile shows also a thickness functional dependence of the curvature. The epilayer lattice curvature has been attributed to a coherent lateral distribution of the Burgers' vectors. An analytical model has been developed in the framework of the continuum elasticity theory to compute the related strain field. The results show small but unexpected contributions to the parallel strain.     

Metallization of the Ge(111) surface at high-temperature probed by energy-loss and Auger spectroscopies

We present new electron energy-loss spectroscopy (EELS) and Auger (AES) experiments aimed to study the structural transition of the Ge(111) surface taking place at high temperatures. Our advanced high-temperature set-up allowed us to collect accurate EELS spectra near the M_2,3 excitation edges and AES MMV and MVV spectra, corresponding to different probing depths ranging from 4 to 10 Å. The metallization of the surface has been clearly detected by the shift of the M_2,3 edge and of the MMV, MVV Auger energies. A detailed study of the transition has been performed using a fine temperature step under thermal equilibrium conditions. The AES and EELS experiments show that a sudden semiconductor-metal transition takes place at about 1000 K involving mainly the topmost layers. Deeper layers within 10 Å are also involved in the metallization process (in a range of 10 above 1010 K) and a smooth change in the topmost layers is also observed at higher temperatures up to 1070 K. These transitions are not fully reversible upon cooling (down to 870 K). Structural and electronic characteristics of the surface transition are discussed in light of available models.     

Carbon nanostructures as an example of the self-organized criticality

The mechanism of self-organized criticality in the region of the nano- and microsizes has been studied experimentally using carbon multiwalled nanotubes and powder polycrystalline graphite as examples. A classical experiment on the formation of samples in the form of “sand heaps” has been described. The specific features of the experiment are the measurement of the electrical resistance of lateral layers at fixed tilt angles of the surface, on which the sample is formed, and the performance of the experiment in the pre-breakdown region of voltages. The observation of the power law for the dependence of the electrical resistance of the samples under study on the number of material portions has demonstrated the manifestation of the mechanism of the self-organized criticality.     

Electronic and magnetic properties of multishell Co nanowires coated with Cu

The structural, electronic, and magnetic properties of ultrathin Cu-coated Co nanowires have been studied by using empirical genetic algorithm simulations and a tight-binding spd model Hamiltonian in the unrestricted Hartree-Fock approximation. For some specific stoichiometric compositions, Cu atoms occupy the surface, while Co atoms prefer to stay in the interior, forming the perfect coated multishell structures. The outer Cu layers lead to substantial variations in the magnetic moment of interior Co atoms, depending on the structure and thickness of Cu layers. In particular, single Co atom row at the center of nanowire is found to be nonmagnetic when coated with two Cu layers. All the other Co nanowires in the coated Cu shell are still magnetic but the magnetic moments are reduced as compared with Co nanowires without Cu coating. The interaction between Cu and Co atoms induces nonzero magnetic moment for Cu atoms.