Super‐hydrophobic (SH) surfaces have garnered significant attention due to their potentially diverse range of applications (e.g., self‐cleaning surfaces, waterproof fabrics, non‐stick containers, and microfluidics). The manufacturing methods of SH surfaces are generally expensive and often require specialized tools. In this study, we employed simplified production methods, and we focused on cheap chemical modification of common polymers using nanocomposites to create SH surfaces. Polymer nanocomposites have many advantages as a coating by increasing volume/area of nanoparticles. Coating clarity, surface hydrophobicity, roughness, electrical properties, and crystallinity are some unique behaviors of nanocomposites. We studied the physical properties of these chemically modified polymers to explore the acquired SH property. We investigated SH films using many techniques such as size‐exclusion chromatography (SEC), X‐ray diffraction (XRD), differential scanning calorimetry (DSC), scanning electron microscopy (SEM), transmission electron microscopy (TEM), and dynamic light scattering (DLS). Our goal was to verify that these materials could be used as SH films that acted as cleaned, solid surfaces in direct contact with packaging surfaces. POLYM. COMPOS., 38:E147–E156, 2017. © 2016 Society of Plastics Engineers

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The smectic C*-alpha (SmC a *) phase is one of the sub-phases of ferroelectric liquid crystals that has drawn much interest due to its electro-optical properties and ultrafast switching. Generally observed above the ferroelectric SmC* phase in temperature, the SmC a * commonly shows only very narrow phase temperature range of a few degree Celsius. To broaden the SmC a * phase, polymer stabilization was investigated for thermal phase stabilization. Two different reactive monomers were tested in three mixtures, and all three broadened the temperature range of the SmC a * phase from 3 C to 39 C. The current reversal method was used to determine the phase existence versus temperature. Moreover, the texture and network structure was studied by polarized optical microscopy and scanning electron microscopy, with the latter revealing the confinement of the smectic layer structure within the porous polymer network. V C 2015 AIP Publishing LLC.