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Electro-Optical Properties of Ferroelectric Nematic Droplets in Isotropic Melt

ORAL

Abstract

The isotropic to ferroelectric nematic liquid transition had been theoretically studied over one hundred years ago, but its experimental studies are rare [1,2]. Here we present electro-optical properties of ferroelectric nematic liquid crystal droplets coexisting with the isotropic melt during direct isotropic to ferroelectric nematic transition [3]. We found that the droplets have flat pancake-like shapes that are thinner than the sample thickness as long as there is room to increase the lateral droplet size. In the center of the droplets a wing-shaped defect with low birefringence moves perpendicular to a weak in-plane electric field, then extends and splits in two at higher fields. After the field is increased above 1V/mm the entire droplet gets deformed and oscillates with the field. These studies led us to determine the polarization field and revealed the presence of a pair of positive and negative bound electric charges due to divergences of polarization around the defect volume.

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Publication: [1] R. Saha, P. Nepal, C. Feng, M. S. Hossain, M. Fukuto, R. Li, J. T. Gleeson, S. Sprunt, R.<br>J. Twieg, and A. Jákli, Multiple Ferroelectric Nematic Phases of a Highly Polar Liquid<br>Crystal Compound, Liq. Cryst. 1, (2022).<br>[2] J. Li et al., How Far Can We Push the Rigid Oligomers/Polymers toward Ferroelectric<br>Nematic Liquid Crystals?, J. Am. Chem. Soc. 143, 17857 (2021).<br>[3] A. Manabe, M. Bremer, and M. Kraska, Ferroelectric Nematic Phase at and below Room<br>Temperature, Liq. Cryst. 48, 1079 (2021).

Presenters

  • Kelum Perera

    Kent State University, Department of Physics, Kent State University, Kent OH, 44242, USA

Authors

  • Kelum Perera

    Kent State University, Department of Physics, Kent State University, Kent OH, 44242, USA

  • Rony Saha

    Kent State University, Department of Physics, Kent State University, Kent OH, 44242, USA

  • Pawan Nepal

    Kent State University, Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, Kent State University, Kent, OH 44242, USA

  • Rohan Dharmarathna

    Kent State University

  • Md Sakhawat Hossain

    Advanced Materials and Liquid Crystal Institute,Kent State U, Materials Science Graduate Program, Advanced Materials and Liquid Crystal Institute, Kent State University, Kent OH, 44242, USA

  • Alex Adaka

    Materials Science Graduate Program, Kent State University,, Materials Science Graduate Program, Advanced Materials and Liquid Crystal Institute, Kent State University, Kent OH

  • Robert J. Twieg

    Kent State University, Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, Kent State University, Kent, OH 44242, USA

  • Antal Jakli

    Kent State University, Materials Science Graduate Program, Kent State University, Kent OH, 44242, USA Department of Physics, Kent State University, Kent OH, 44242, USA, Materials Science Graduate Program, Advanced Materials and Liquid Crystal Institute, Kent State University, Kent OH, 44242, USA, Department of Physics, Kent State University, Department of Physics, Advanced Materials and Liquid Crystal Institute, Kent State University, Kent State Univerity