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Published December 23, 2008 | Submitted
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Characterization of soft stripe-domain deformations in SmC and SmC* liquid-crystal elastomers

Abstract

The neo-classical model of SmC (and SmC*) elastomers developed by Warner and Adams predicts a class of "soft" (zero energy) deformations. We find and describe the full set of stripe-domains – laminate structures in which the laminates alternate between two different deformations – that can form between pairs of these soft deformations. All the stripe-domains fall into two classes, one in which the smectic layers are not bent at the interfaces, but for which, in the SmC* case, the interfaces are charged, and one in which the smectic layers are bent but the interfaces are never charged. Striped deformations significantly enhance the softness of the macroscopic elastic response.

Additional Information

We are grateful for many interesting and important discussions with Professor Mark Warner. This work was carried out during various visits by Biggins to Caltech and Bhattacharya to Cambridge. We gratefully acknowledge the financial support of the CamSURF program at Caltech, the Powell Foundation, the Sims scholarship and the EPSRC.

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Created:
August 20, 2023
Modified:
October 24, 2023