Coarsening in bent-core liquid crystals: a molecular dynamics study

Nishant Birdi; Nigel B Wilding; Sanjay Puri; Varsha Banerjee

doi:10.1039/D4SM01460J

Coarsening in bent-core liquid crystals: a molecular dynamics study

Nishant Birdi^*, Nigel B Wilding, Sanjay Puri, Varsha Banerjee

^*Corresponding author for this work

School of Physics

Research output: Contribution to journal › Article (Academic Journal) › peer-review

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Abstract

We use molecular dynamics simulations to study coarsening dynamics in achiral banana-shaped bent-core liquid crystals following a quench from the high concentration polar smectic (SmX) phase to lower concentrations that favor the exotic twist-bend (TB) phase. Our novel result is the identification of an intermediate splay-bend state emerging prior to the eventual TB phase. The latter coarsens via the annihilation of beta lines which are analogous to string defects in nematic liquid crystals. Our findings are relevant for a large class of chiral systems assembled from achiral entities.

Original language	English
Pages (from-to)	4606-4613
Number of pages	8
Journal	Soft Matter
Volume	21
Issue number	23
Early online date	26 Apr 2025
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1039/D4SM01460J
Publication status	Published - 1 Jun 2025

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© 2025 The Royal Society of Chemistry.

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title = "Coarsening in bent-core liquid crystals: a molecular dynamics study",

abstract = "We use molecular dynamics simulations to study coarsening dynamics in achiral banana-shaped bent-core liquid crystals following a quench from the high concentration polar smectic (SmX) phase to lower concentrations that favor the exotic twist-bend (TB) phase. Our novel result is the identification of an intermediate splay-bend state emerging prior to the eventual TB phase. The latter coarsens via the annihilation of beta lines which are analogous to string defects in nematic liquid crystals. Our findings are relevant for a large class of chiral systems assembled from achiral entities.",

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TY - JOUR

T1 - Coarsening in bent-core liquid crystals

T2 - a molecular dynamics study

AU - Birdi, Nishant

AU - Wilding, Nigel B

AU - Puri, Sanjay

AU - Banerjee, Varsha

PY - 2025/6/1

Y1 - 2025/6/1

N2 - We use molecular dynamics simulations to study coarsening dynamics in achiral banana-shaped bent-core liquid crystals following a quench from the high concentration polar smectic (SmX) phase to lower concentrations that favor the exotic twist-bend (TB) phase. Our novel result is the identification of an intermediate splay-bend state emerging prior to the eventual TB phase. The latter coarsens via the annihilation of beta lines which are analogous to string defects in nematic liquid crystals. Our findings are relevant for a large class of chiral systems assembled from achiral entities.

AB - We use molecular dynamics simulations to study coarsening dynamics in achiral banana-shaped bent-core liquid crystals following a quench from the high concentration polar smectic (SmX) phase to lower concentrations that favor the exotic twist-bend (TB) phase. Our novel result is the identification of an intermediate splay-bend state emerging prior to the eventual TB phase. The latter coarsens via the annihilation of beta lines which are analogous to string defects in nematic liquid crystals. Our findings are relevant for a large class of chiral systems assembled from achiral entities.

UR - https://arxiv.org/abs/2405.03189

U2 - 10.1039/D4SM01460J

DO - 10.1039/D4SM01460J

M3 - Article (Academic Journal)

SN - 1744-683X

VL - 21

SP - 4606

EP - 4613

JO - Soft Matter

JF - Soft Matter

IS - 23

ER -

Coarsening in bent-core liquid crystals: a molecular dynamics study

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