Abstract
This article summarizes the results obtained by various experimental methods on the physical properties of a bent-core nematic liquid crystal 4-chloro-1,3-phenylene bis-4-[4′-(9-decenyloxy) benzoyloxy] benzoate (ClPbis10BB). The material exhibits unusual properties in all aspects tested. Its bend flexoelectric coefficient is 1000 times larger than in calamitics; it is viscoelastic with a large, shear-rate-dependent viscosity. Its bend and twist elastic constants are abnormally low; thus the nematic phase can be rendered to be a blue fog phase with a small amount of chiral dopant. It shows very high flow birefringence and unusually small leading Landau coefficient. It has two types of isotropic phases; at lower temperature it is probably tetrahedratic that can be transferred into the nematic phase with magnetic field. ClPbis10BB has a frequency-dependent conductivity anisotropy which is characterized by a double sign inversion. It exhibits various electroconvection (EC) patterns which are currently not understood in the frame of the standard theory of EC.
Acknowledgments
Financial supports by the Hungarian Research Funds OTKA-K-81250 and by NSF DMR-0964765 are gratefully acknowledged.