ISIS Neutron and Muon Source Data Journal

Paranematic order of nano-confined nCFPB liquid crystals

Abstract: Spatial confinement on the micro- and nanoscale can markedly affect the physics of liquid crystals (LCs). There is no ??true?? isotropic-nematic (I-N) transition for LCs confined in geometries spatially restricted in at least one direction to a few nanometres. The anchoring at the confining walls, quantified by a surface field, imposes a partial orientational, that is, a partially nematic ordering of the confined LCs, even at temperatures T far above the bulk I-N transition temperature. The strong first-order I-N transition is replaced by a weak continuous paranematic-nematic (P-N) transition, depending on the strength of the surface orientational field in nanoscopic straight channels in anodic aluminum oxide (AAO) membranes. We propose studies of the self-organization of nCFPB LC molecules in confinement via a series of SANS measurements at thermodynamically characteristic temperatures to provide important structural information for both soft matter theory and practical applications of certain LCs in displays and sensors.

Principal Investigator: Dr Oleksandr Tomchuk
Experimenter: Dr Anna Drzewicz
Experimenter: Professor Wojciech Zajac
Experimenter: Dr Ewa Juszynska
Local Contact: Dr Leide Cavalcanti
Experimenter: Dr Miros?aw Ga??zka
Experimenter: Dr Marcin Piwowarczyk

DOI: 10.5286/ISIS.E.RB2510722

ISIS Experiment Number: RB2510722

Publisher: STFC ISIS Neutron and Muon Source

Data format: RAW/Nexus
Select the data format above to find out more about it.

Data Citation

The recommended format for citing this dataset in a research publication is as:
[author], [date], [title], [publisher], [doi]

For Example:
Dr Oleksandr Tomchuk et al; (2025): Paranematic order of nano-confined nCFPB liquid crystals, STFC ISIS Neutron and Muon Source, https://doi.org/10.5286/ISIS.E.RB2510722

Data is released under the CC-BY-4.0 license.