High-resolution x-ray scattering studies of the nonpolar thermotropic liquid crystal 4-n-pentylphenylthiol-4'-n-octyloxybenzoate (8S5) in aerosil gel nanonetworks reveal that the aerosil-induced disorder significantly alters both the nematic to smectic-A and smectic-A to smectic-C phase transitions. The limiting 8S5 smectic-A correlation length follows a power-law dependence on the aerosil dens...

Slow molecular processes in a nematic liquid crystal confined to random porous network formed by aerosil particles M. Rajeswari a , S. Dhara a , K. Venu b , V.S.S. Sastry a & R. Dabrowski c a School of Physics, University of Hyderabad, Hyderabad 500 046, Andhra Pradesh, India b Soctronics Technologies Pvt. Ltd, Hyderabad 500 034, Andhra Pradesh, India c Institute of Chemistry, Military Universi...

There is a well-known de Gennes coupling between the scalar nematic order parameter S and the smectic density-wave amplitude /Psi/, which causes the nematic-smectic-A phase transition to cross over from second order to first order via a tricritical point. This sort of crossover is observed for numerous liquid crystals (LCs) with small to moderate nematic ranges. Recent studies of LC+aerosil sys...

We have studied the effects of quenched random disorder created by dispersed aerosil nanoparticle gels on the nematic to smectic- A (N- SmA ) and smectic- A to reentrant nematic ( SmA -RN) phase transitions of thermotropic liquid-crystal mixtures of hexyloxycyanobiphenyl (6OCB) and octyloxycyanobiphenyl (8OCB). These effects are probed using high-resolution synchrotron x-ray diffraction techniq...

High-resolution x-ray diffraction and ac-calorimetric experiments have been carried out on the liquid-crystal octyloxycyanobiphenyl in which aerosil particles are dispersed. The measurements were made over a temperature range around the bulk nematic to smectic-A transition temperature. At this transition the liquid crystal breaks translational symmetry in a single direction. The silica particle...

R. Mondaini,1,2 T. Paiva,3 and R. T. Scalettar2 1Physics Department, The Pennsylvania State University, 104 Davey Laboratory, University Park, Pennsylvania 16802, USA 2Physics Department, University of California, Davis, California 95616, USA 3Instituto de Fı́sica, Universidade Federal do Rio de Janeiro Cx.P. 68.528, 21941-972 Rio de Janeiro RJ, Brazil (Received 14 August 2014; published 14 Octo...

R. Santoprete, 2 P. Kratzer, M. Scheffler, R. B. Capaz, and Belita Koiller Instituto de F́ısica, Universidade Federal do Rio de Janeiro, Caixa Postal 68528, 21941-972 Rio de Janeiro, Brazil Laboratoire de Physique des Interfaces et des Couches Minces, CNRS-Ecole Polytechnique, 91128 Palaiseau cedex, France Fritz-Haber-Institut der Max-Planck-Gesellschaft, Faradayweg 4-6, 14195 Berlin, Germany (D...

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Valmir C. Barbosa, Raul Donangelo, 3 and Sergio R. Souza 4 Programa de Engenharia de Sistemas e Computação, COPPE, Universidade Federal do Rio de Janeiro, Caixa Postal 68511, 21941-972 Rio de Janeiro RJ, Brazil Instituto de F́ısica, Universidade Federal do Rio de Janeiro, Caixa Postal 68528, 21941-972 Rio de Janeiro RJ, Brazil Instituto de F́ısica, Facultad de Ingenieŕıa, Universidad de la Repúbl...

Comprehensive x-ray scattering studies have characterized the smectic ordering of octylcyanobiphenyl (8CB) confined in the hydrogen-bonded silica gels formed by aerosil dispersions. For all densities of aerosil and all measurement temperatures, the correlations remain short range, demonstrating that the disorder imposed by the gels destroys the nematic (N) to smectic-A (SmA) transition. The sme...