Nematic liquid crystals in lens shape geometry

ABSTRACT

Sessile nematic droplets provide a possibility to study the combined effect of anchoring at solid and gas interfaces. The combination of various alignments at the two surfaces and external fields results in a variety of director distribution schemes, ranging from a defect-free, almost homogeneous state to configurations with point-, line- and wall defects. This paper reviews recent results obtained on sessile droplets of uniaxial nematic liquid crystals, such as temperature-controlled anchoring transitions, formation and dynamics of Néel wall type metastable inversion walls in magnetic and/or electric fields. The structures of the recently discovered twist-bend and ferroelectric nematic liquid crystals will also be briefly discussed.

Graphical abstract

Acknowledgment

This work was financially supported by the Hungarian National Research, Development, and Innovation Office under grant NKFIH FK142643 and the US National Science Foundation under grant DMR-2210083. This paper was supported by the János Bolyai Research Scholarship of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Funding

The work was supported by the NSF [DMR-2210083]; Hungarian National Research, Development, and Innovation Office [NKFIH FK142643].