Energy landscape view of phase transitions and slow dynamics in thermotropic liquid crystals.

Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America
Dwaipayan Chakrabarti, Biman Bagchi

Abstract

Thermotropic liquid crystals are known to display rich phase behavior on temperature variation. Although the nematic phase is orientationally ordered but translationally disordered, a smectic phase is characterized by the appearance of a partial translational order in addition to a further increase in orientational order. In an attempt to understand the interplay between orientational and translational order in the mesophases that thermotropic liquid crystals typically exhibit upon cooling from the high-temperature isotropic phase, we investigate the potential energy landscapes of a family of model liquid crystalline systems. The configurations of the system corresponding to the local potential energy minima, known as the inherent structures, are determined from computer simulations across the mesophases. We find that the depth of the potential energy minima explored by the system along an isochor grows through the nematic phase as temperature drops in contrast to its insensitivity to temperature in the isotropic and smectic phases. The onset of the growth of the orientational order in the parent phase is found to induce a translational order, resulting in a smectic-like layer in the underlying inherent structures; the inherent...Continue Reading

References

Dec 31, 2005·Physical Review Letters·Dwaipayan ChakrabartiBiman Bagchi

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Citations

Aug 3, 2014·The Journal of Chemical Physics·D Venkata SaiSurajit Dhara
Jul 23, 2008·Physical Review. E, Statistical, Nonlinear, and Soft Matter Physics·Dwaipayan Chakrabarti, David J Wales
Aug 7, 2007·Physical Review. E, Statistical, Nonlinear, and Soft Matter Physics·A R BrásA Schönhals
Dec 13, 2006·Physical Review. E, Statistical, Nonlinear, and Soft Matter Physics·Dwaipayan Chakrabarti, Biman Bagchi
Nov 9, 2011·Physical Review. E, Statistical, Nonlinear, and Soft Matter Physics·Sylwester J RzoskaKrzysztof Czupryński
Oct 10, 2006·Physical Review. E, Statistical, Nonlinear, and Soft Matter Physics·Giorgio Cinacchi, Valentina Domenici
Aug 7, 2007·Physical Review. E, Statistical, Nonlinear, and Soft Matter Physics·Biman JanaBiman Bagchi
Apr 27, 2011·Physical Review. E, Statistical, Nonlinear, and Soft Matter Physics·Sarmistha Sarkar, Biman Bagchi
Sep 21, 2007·The Journal of Physical Chemistry. B·Dwaipayan Chakrabarti, Biman Bagchi

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