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Updated: Sep 20, 2026

Orientational Transition in a Liquid Crystal Triggered by the Thermodynamic Growth of Interfacial Wetting Sheets
Published on: May 15, 2017
Double reentrance of surface arrangements in freestanding liquid crystal films
1School of Physics and Astronomy, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, Minnesota 55455, USA.
Abstract:
The molecular arrangement of tilted surface layers on freestanding films above the bulk smectic-A-smectic-C(*) transition has been studied by null transmission ellipsometry. In the presence of an applied in-plane electric field, a synclinic-anticlinic-synclinic-anticlinic double reentrance has been observed. Furthermore, we have characterized a novel transition from the synclinic arrangement to a structure in which the interior layers tilt in the same orientation and the outermost surface layers tilt oppositely with the interior layers.

