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Updated: Nov 29, 2025

Combining Microfluidics and Microrheology to Determine Rheological Properties of Soft Matter during Repeated Phase Transitions
Published on: April 19, 2018
Volume Phase Transitions of Heliconical Cholesteric Gels under an External Field along the Helix Axis
1Department of Physics and Information Technology, Faculty of Computer Science and Systems Engineering, Kyushu Institute of Technology, Kawazu 680-4, Iizuka, Fukuoka 820-8502, Japan.
Abstract:
We present a mean field theory to describe cholesteric elastomers and gels under an external field, such as an electric or a magnetic field, along the helix axis of a cholesteric phase. We study the deformations and volume phase transitions of cholesteric gels as a function of the external field and temperature. Our theory predicts the phase transitions between isotropic (I), nematic (N), and heliconical cholesteric (ChH) phases and the deformations of the elastomers at these phase transition temperatures. We also find volume phase transitions at the I-ChH and the N-ChH phase transitions.
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