Mesomorphic chiral non-symmetrical dimers: synthesis and characterization

The preparation and phase transitional properties of several optically active non-symmetrical dimers are reported. Two types of dimeric mesogens formed by covalently combining pro-mesogenic cholesterol with either phenyl 4-cyanobenzoate (polar) or phenyl trans-4-pentylcyclohexanecarboxylate (apolar) cores in an end-to-end fashion through an ω-oxyalkanoyl spacer were investigated. The phase behaviour of these two types of dimers differs, indicating that the nature and extent of mesomorphism are sensitive to the structure of the mesogen attached to the cholesterol. However, within the series, the spacer parity greatly influences the clearing temperatures of the materials, as expected. In general, all the compounds display an enantiotropic chiral nematic (N*) phase; several of them also stabilize smectic and/or twist grain boundary phases. The optical properties of the N* phase of all the compounds were investigated with the aid of both UV-visible and chiroptical spectroscopic techniques. These complementary studies revealed that the dimers exhibit an odd-even effect in the wavelength of selective reflection, with even-parity members having higher values, similar to previous reports. The chiroptical spectroscopy indicated that the N* pitch is right-handed for all the investigated dimers, which is in accordance with the fact that most steroidal esters are right-handed.