Microscopy of Diffuse Nematic-Isotropic Transition in Main-Chain Nematic Liquid-Crystal Elastomers
Accepted version
Peer-reviewed
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Repository DOI
Change log
Authors
Ohzono, T https://orcid.org/0000-0003-2185-2504
Katoh, K
Terentjev, EM https://orcid.org/0000-0003-3517-6578
Abstract
Nematic-isotropic phase transition in liquid crystal elastomers (LCE), which drastically alters the macroscopic properties of the material, is attractive for both fundamental physics and applications. Here, we introduce new experimental methods based on polarized and fluorescence optical microscopy to characterize the phase transition of polydomain LCE, monitoring the order parameter and the nematic domain structure. It is demonstrated that polydomain main-chain nematic LCE exhibit an ordering transition very different from the classical first-order one, having a diffuse continuous nature. Unexpectedly, characteristic correlation length of the fading polydomain structure remains unchanged across the transition.
Description
Keywords
40 Engineering, 34 Chemical Sciences
Journal Title
Macromolecules
Conference Name
Journal ISSN
0024-9297
1520-5835
1520-5835
Volume Title
54
Publisher
American Chemical Society (ACS)
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Rights
All rights reserved
Sponsorship
European Research Council (786659)
ERC H2020