Stability of biaxial nematic phase for systems with variable molecular shape anisotropy

We study the influence of fluctuations in molecular shape on the stability of the biaxial nematic phase by generalizing the mean-field model of Mulder and Ruijgrok [Physica A 113, 145 (1982)]. We limit ourselves to the case when the molecular shape anisotropy, represented by the alignment tensor, is a random variable of an annealed type. A prototype of such behavior can be found in lyotropic systems--a mixture of potassium laurate, 1-decanol, and D2O , where distribution of the micellar shape adjusts to actual equilibrium conditions. Further examples of materials with the biaxial nematic phase, where molecular shape is subject to fluctuations, are thermotropic materials composed of flexible trimericlike or tetrapodlike molecular units. Our calculations show that the Gaussian equilibrium distribution of the variables describing molecular shape (dispersion force) anisotropy gives rise to new classes of the phase diagrams, absent in the original model. Depending on properties of the shape fluctuations, the stability of the biaxial nematic phase can be either enhanced or depressed, relative to the uniaxial nematic phases. In the former case the splitting of the Landau point into two triple points with a direct phase transition line from isotropic to biaxial phase is observed.