Dynamics of the director reorientation in confined nematic liquid crystals imposed by a strong orthogonal electric field

[摘要] The dynamics of the periodic distortions in confined nematic liquid crystals (LCs) has been investigated theoretically basing on the hydrodynamic theory including the director motion with appropriate boundary and initial conditions. Analysis of the numerical results for the turn-on process provides an evidence for the appearance of the spatially periodic patterns in confined LC film, only in response to the suddenly applied strong electric field. It has been shown that there is a threshold value of the amplitude of the thermal fluctuations of the director over the LC sample which provides the nonuniform rotation mode rather than the uniform one, whereas the lower values of the amplitude dominate the uniform mode. During the turn-off process the reorientation of the director to the direction preferred by the surfaces is characterized by the complex destruction of the initially periodic structure to a monodomain state.

[发布机构] Moscow Technological University, Vernadsky pr. 78, Moscow; 119454, Russia^1;Saint Petersburg Institute for Machine Sciences, Russian Academy of Sciences, Saint Petersburg; 199178, Russia^2

[效力级别] 数学

[关键词] Boundary and initial conditions;Director reorientation;Hydrodynamic theory;Nonuniform rotation;Orthogonal electric fields;Periodic distortions;Strong electric fields;Thermal fluctuations