Formation of monodomain polymer-stabilized blue phase liquid crystals using surface acoustic waves

Abstract

This work uses surface acoustic waves (SAWs) that are generated by a piezoelectric substrate containing an interdigital transducer (IDT) to which a low voltage of 2 mV was applied at a frequency of 1 kHz to fabricate a polymer-stabilized blue phase liquid crystal (PS-BPLC) layer. The PS-BPLC layer has a more uniform optical microscope (OM) image at a voltage of 2 mV than at zero voltage, and its reflective spectrum exhibits a smaller full width at half maximum (FWHM) at the former than at the latter. The uniform OM image and small FWHM reveal that the lattices in the PS-BPLC layer have monodomain structure. The monodomain PS-BPLC layer is formed because the SAWs cause longitudinal and transverse vibrations of the PS-BPLC lattices in the vertical plane along their traveling direction. The proposed method for fabricating the monodomain PS-BPLC layer using the SAWs has potential for the development of reflective optical devices that consume low power during their fabrication.

Spontaneous formation of liquid-crystalline nuclei in blue-phase liquid crystals based on different chirality

“…Therefore, the fundamental understanding of the mechanism and liquid crystalline nucleation in BP lattices, especially the evolution of cubic structure caused by different chirality, is particularly important in this phase transition. Besides, the lattice orientation in these two common phase transitions induced by the electric field, 29 surface rubbing 30,31 or other methods 32 usually induce [011] orientation of BPI, and [001] orientation of BPII in most cases. By the nano-etching method, Jose A. Martínez-González et al fabricated BPII [011] lattice orientation with a two-dimensional surface pattern.…”