Playing with discs

Abstract

The hierarchical self-assembly of disc-shaped molecules leads to the formation of discotic liquid crystals. These intriguing materials are of fundamental importance not only as models for the study of energy and charge migration in self-organised systems, but also as functional materials for various device applications. This has fostered numerous developments in this field. In this article, we have summarised the author's and the collaborators' research work on discotic liquid crystals.

Keywords:

• discotic liquid crystals
• columnar phase
• nematic phase
• liquid crystal displays
• organic semiconductors

Acknowledgement

I would like to thank Professor Ivan J. B. Lin for his wonderful hospitality during my stay at NDHU, Hualien, Taiwan.