Manipulating the twist sense of helical nanofilaments of bent-core liquid crystals using rod-shaped,chiral mesogenic dopants |
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Authors: | Michael R Tuchband Dong Chen Balazs Horanyi Min Shuai Yongqiang Shen Eva Korblova |
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Institution: | 1. Department of Physics and Soft Materials Research Center, University of Colorado, Boulder, CO, USAmichael.tuchband@colorado.edu;3. Department of Physics and Soft Materials Research Center, University of Colorado, Boulder, CO, USA;4. Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry and Soft Materials Research Center, University of Colorado, Boulder, CO, USA |
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Abstract: | In some liquid crystal (LC) mixtures of bent-core host molecules that form helical nanofilaments (HNFs) and chiral, rod-shaped molecular guests, the spontaneous chirality of the HNFs is not influenced by the guest handedness. In other mixtures, the filaments become homochiral, responding to the handedness of the guest. We show that the important distinction between these two behaviours is the solubility of the guest material in the HNF phase. In our experiments, chiral LC mesogens doped into the HNF phase result in an enantiomeric imbalance and sometimes change the phase sequence on cooling from the isotropic melt. |
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Keywords: | Bent-core liquid crystals helical nanofilaments chirality NOBOW guest/host mixtures |
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