Spatially confined liquid crystals (LCs) exhibit non-uniform alignment, often accompanied by self-organized topological defects of non-trivial shape in response to imposed boundary conditions and geometry. Here we show that a nematic LC, when confined in a sinusoidal microwrinkle groove, exhibits a new periodic arrangement of twist deformations and a zigzag line defect. This periodic ordering results from the inherent LC elastic anisotropy and the antagonistic boundary conditions at the top flat LC and the curved LC-groove interfaces. The effect of the LC thickness on the stability of the line defect is also shown.

Date Published: 12 September 2013
PDF: 6 pages
Proc. SPIE 8828, Liquid Crystals XVII, 88280V (12 September 2013); doi: 10.1117/12.2022419

Published in SPIE Proceedings Vol. 8828:
Liquid Crystals XVII
Iam Choon Khoo, Editor(s)