Related Experiment Video
Updated: Jul 11, 2026

High-Contrast and Fast Photorheological Switching of a Twist-Bend Nematic Liquid Crystal
Published on: October 31, 2019
Phase diagram of chiral biopolymer Wigner crystals
Gregory M Grason1, Robijn F Bruinsma
1Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of California at Los Angeles, Los Angeles, California 90024, USA.
Abstract:
We study the statistical mechanics of counterion Wigner crystals associated with hexagonal bundles of chiral biopolymers. We show that, due to spontaneous chiral symmetry breaking induced by frustration, these Wigner crystals would be chiral even if the biopolymers themselves were not chiral. Using a duality transformation of the model onto a "spin-charge" Hamiltonian, we show that melting of the Wigner crystal is due to the unbinding of screw dislocations and that the melting temperature has a singular dependence on the intrinsic chirality of the biopolymers. Finally, we report that, if electrostatic interactions are strongly screened, the counterions can condense in the form of an intermediate achiral Wigner solid phase that melts by the unbinding of fractional topological charges.
Related Concept Videos
Chirality
Chiral objects exhibit a sense of handedness when they interact with another chiral object. For example, our left foot can only fit in the left shoe and not in the right shoe. Achiral objects — objects that have...
Chirality in Nature
Fischer Projections
Polymer Classification: Stereospecificity
Prochirality
Polymer Classification: Crystallinity
Crystalline domains are the regions where polymer chains are aligned in an orderly manner and held together in proximity by intermolecular forces. For example, chains in the crystalline domains of polyethylene and nylon are bound together by van der Waals...

