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Updated: Jul 19, 2026

Orientational Transition in a Liquid Crystal Triggered by the Thermodynamic Growth of Interfacial Wetting Sheets
Published on: May 15, 2017
Emergence of hexatic and threefold hidden order in two-dimensional smectic liquid crystals: A Monte Carlo study
Farhad Shahbazi1, Rasool Ghanbari
1Department of Physics, Isfahan University of Technology, 84156, Isfahan, Iran. shahbazi@cc.iut.ac.ir
Abstract:
Using a high resolution Monte Carlo simulation technique based on a multihistogram method and cluster algorithm, we have investigated the critical properties of a coupled XY model, consisting of a sixfold symmetric hexatic and a hidden order parameter of threefold symmetry in two dimensions. The simulation results demonstrate a series of continuous transitions in which both kinds of orderings are established simultaneously. It is found that the specific-heat anomaly exponents for some regions in coupling constants space are in excellent agreement with the experimentally measured exponents extracted from heat-capacity data near the smectic- A -hexatic- B transition of two-layer free standing films.
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