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From Molecules to Materials: Engineering New Ionic Liquid Crystals Through Halogen Bonding
Published on: March 24, 2018
Liquid crystal phases of two-dimensional dipolar gases and Berezinskii-Kosterlitz-Thouless melting
Zhigang Wu1, Jens K Block1, Georg M Bruun1
1Aarhus University, Department of Physics and Astronomy, Aarhus C, DK-8000, Denmark.
Abstract:
Liquid crystals are phases of matter intermediate between crystals and liquids. Whereas classical liquid crystals have been known for a long time and are used in electro-optical displays, much less is known about their quantum counterparts. There is growing evidence that quantum liquid crystals play a central role in many electron systems including high temperature superconductors, but a quantitative understanding is lacking due to disorder and other complications. Here, we analyse the quantum phase diagram of a two-dimensional dipolar gas, which exhibits stripe, nematic and supersolid phases. We calculate the stiffness constants determining the stability of the nematic and stripe phases, and the melting of the stripes set by the proliferation of topological defects is analysed microscopically. Our results for the critical temperatures of these phases demonstrate that a controlled study of the interplay between quantum liquid and superfluid phases is within experimental reach for the first time, using dipolar gases.
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