Director Distortion and Phase Modulation in Deformable Nematic and Smectic Liquid Crystal Spheroids

Area of Science:

• Materials Science
• Soft Matter Physics
• Nanoscience

Background:

• Integrating liquid crystals (LCs) into flexible and miniaturized technologies requires understanding their behavior under geometric constraints.
• The interplay between surface anchoring, material order, and curved geometry is crucial for LC applications.

Purpose of the Study:

• To investigate the competition between surface-induced orientation and deformable curved boundaries in stretched nematic and smectic microdroplets.
• To explore how uniaxial and biaxial strain affects the director field and layering in liquid crystal microdroplets.

Main Methods:

• Combined experimental techniques with computational simulations.
• Analyzed nematic and smectic liquid crystal microdroplets under uniaxial and biaxial mechanical strain.

Main Results:

• Uniaxial strain in nematic LCs caused director field reorientation and formation of a larger twisted defect ring.
• Biaxial extension led to initial twisting and then a uniform vertical orientation of the nematic director field at high strains.
• Smectic LCs transitioned from radial layering to quasi-flat layering, recovering radial configuration upon strain removal, while nematic LCs became trapped in a metastable vertical state.

Conclusions:

• The study provides insights into the director field behavior of nematic and smectic liquid crystals in deformed microdroplets.
• Findings support the rational design of advanced LC-based flexible devices, such as sensors, displays, and smart windows.