abstract

• Chiral nematic liquid crystals are known to form blue phases - liquid states of matter that exhibit ordered cubic arrangements of topological defects. Blue-phase specimens, however, are generally polycrystalline, consisting of randomly oriented domains that limit their performance in applications. A strategy that relies on nano-patterned substrates is presented here for preparation of stable, macroscopic single-crystal blue-phase materials. Different template designs are conceived to exert control over different planes of the blue-phase lattice orientation with respect to the underlying substrate. Experiments are then used to demonstrate that it is indeed possible to create stable single-crystal blue-phase domains with the desired orientation over large regions. These results provide a potential avenue to fully exploit the electro-optical properties of blue phases, which have been hindered by the existence of grain boundaries.

authors

• De Pablo J.J.
• Li X.
• Martínez González José Adrián
• Nealey P.F.
• Sadati M.
• Zhang R.
• Zhou Y.

publication date

• 2017-01-01

published in

• Nature Communications  Journal

keywords

• crystal structure; experimental design; experimental study; lattice dynamics; performance assessment; topology; grain; liquid crystal

Digital Object Identifier (DOI)

• 10.1038/ncomms15854

PubMed ID

• 28621314

start page

end page

volume

• 8