Nucleation and growth of a helical nanofilament (B4) liquid-crystal phase confined in nanobowls

The B4 helical nanofilament (HNF) liquid crystal (LC) phase is a three-dimensional (3D) helical structure composed of 2D smectic layers. Because of the complex shape of the HNF phase, it is difficult to understand the generation mechanism of HNFs in the bulk as well as in the thin-film condition. He...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Published in:Soft matter 2015-01, Vol.11 (39), p.7778-7782
Main Authors: Ryu, Seong Ho, Kim, Hanim, Lee, Sunhee, Cha, Yun Jeong, Shin, Tae Joo, Ahn, Hyungju, Korblova, Eva, Walba, David M, Clark, Noel A, Lee, Sang Bok, Yoon, Dong Ki
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Diffraction
Film thickness
Helical
Liquid crystals
Nanostructure
Nucleation
Thin films
Three dimensional
Citations: Items that this one cites
Items that cite this one
Online Access:Get full text
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Description
Summary:The B4 helical nanofilament (HNF) liquid crystal (LC) phase is a three-dimensional (3D) helical structure composed of 2D smectic layers. Because of the complex shape of the HNF phase, it is difficult to understand the generation mechanism of HNFs in the bulk as well as in the thin-film condition. Here, we directly investigated the nucleation and growth of HNFs in nanobowls. A combination of electron microscopy and X-ray diffraction was used to reveal the transitional surface structures, in which barrel-like structures as well as short HNFs with random handedness were observed, depending on the LC film thickness. These results will be useful in achieving a better understanding of thin film structures of complex chiral structures in soft matter.
ISSN:1744-683X
1744-6848
DOI:10.1039/c5sm01783a