What is it about?
Creating patterns of droplets within a larger nematic liquid crystal droplet. The arrangements are controlled by the topological defects that occur in the director field and the elastic deformation induced by the droplets. The various patterns are controlled by size ratios, the rules for which are given,.
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Why is it important?
Switchable Photonic materials from one self assembled pattern to another is a major aim. This work showed that a variety of different arrangements could be formed, depending on the ratio of particle / droplet sizes.
Perspectives
This work came from an accidental discovery of a variety of structures that at first were thought to be stabilised by quantum dots or other nano-particles. However, the structures were found to be more generic, and beautiful. Exploring the underlying physics of the problem took us from Thomson and his plum-pudding model of the atom, to Mandelbrot and the world of fractal structures.
Prof Cliff Jones
University of Leeds
Read the Original
This page is a summary of: Self-assembly of fractal liquid crystal colloids, Nature Communications, January 2019, Springer Science + Business Media,
DOI: 10.1038/s41467-018-08210-w.
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