Nematic twist-bend phases (NTB) are new types of nematic liquid crystalline phases with attractive properties for future electro-optic applications. However, most of these states are monotropic or are stable only in a narrow high temperature range. They are often destabilized under moderate cooling, and only a few single compounds have shown to give room temperature NTB phases. Mixtures of twist-bend nematic liquid crystals with simple nematogens have shown to strongly lower the nematic to NTB phase transition temperature. Here, we examined the behaviour of new types of mixtures with the dimeric liquid crystal [4′,4′-(heptane-1,7-diyl)bis(([1′,1″-biphenyl]4″-carbo-nitrile))] (CB7CB). This now well-known twist-bend nematic liquid crystal presents a nematic twist-bend phase below T ≈ 104 °C. Mixtures with other monomeric alkyl or alkoxy -biphenylcarbonitriles liquid crystals that display a smectic A (SmA) phase also strongly reduce this temperature. The most interesting smectogen is 4′-Octyl-4-biphenylcarbonitrile (8CB), for which a long-term metastable NTB phase is found at room and lower temperatures. This paper presents the complete phase diagram of the corresponding binary system and a detailed investigation of its thermal, optical, dielectric, and elastic properties.
In this work, we are interested in the nucleation of bâtonnets at the Isotropic/Smectic A phase transition of 10CB liquid crystal. Very often, these bâtonnets are decorated with a large number of focal conics. We present here an example of a bâtonnet obtained by optical crossed polarized microscopy in a frequently observed particular area of the sample. This bâtonnet presents bulges and one of them consists of a tessellation of ellipses. These ellipses are two by two tangent, one to each other, and their confocal hyperbolas merge at the apex of the bâtonnet. We propose a numerical simulation with Python software to reproduce this tiling of ellipses as well as the shape of the smectic layers taking the well-known shape of Dupin cyclides within this particular bâtonnet area.
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