The 2010 Luckhurst–Samulski Prize

The 2010 Luckhurst–Samulski Prize

The Luckhurst–Samulski Prize was announced in 2009 [1] and was awarded for the first time last year [2]. This major award in the field of liquid crystals is named after Geoffrey Luckhurst and Ed Samulski, not only in honour of their roles as Founding Editors of the journal Liquid Crystals, but also to mark their outstanding contributions to liquid crystal science. The Prize is awarded for the best paper published each year in Liquid Crystals and a full description of the prize along with its terms and conditions can be found on the Journal's website [3]. The inaugural winner of the Luckhurst–Samulski Prize was a paper by John Goodby and his colleagues, entitled Molecular complexity and the control of self-organising processes [4]. A further four papers were highly commended by the Selection Committee [5–8].

In 2010, Liquid Crystals published 171 articles spanning all areas of liquid crystal science and technology. In accordance with the Prize's terms and conditions, referees can bring papers to the attention of the Committee which they feel should be considered for the Prize but the decision rests with the Selection Committee. In a first pass, eight papers were chosen for a shortlist from which the winner was to be selected. These eight papers were all of the very highest quality and any one of them would have made an outstanding winner of the Prize.

I am delighted to report that the 2010 Luckhurst–Samulski Prize has been awarded to the paper by Antal Jákli entitled Electro-mechanical effects in liquid crystals [9] which appeared in the Commemorative Issue of the Journal dedicated to Alfred Saupe. Geoffrey Luckhurst announced this outcome and presented the Prize to Professor Jákli at a ceremony held at the 11th European Conference on Liquid Crystals held in Maribor, Slovenia. In his paper, Professor Jákli presents, for the first time, a review and classification of linear and quadratic electromechanical effects. It is both focused on an intriguing set of effects while being broad in scope and provides the reader with not only a technical background to the area but also a historical one. This paper is not simply a review, however, but also includes new comparisons between liquid crystals, rubber-like systems and solids. These electromechanical effects are becoming increasingly important for energy conversion and micro-energy-generating devices and as such this paper provides an important insight into a non-display area of liquid crystal science with very real application potential. The Selection Committee felt that it will provide the inspiration for more researchers to work in this important area.

The remaining seven articles were highly commended by the Selection Committee and these included, in strict chronological order, the paper by Vroege and his colleagues entitled Uniaxial and biaxial liquid crystal phases in colloidal dispersions of board-like particles [10] in which the authors describe a versatile colloidal model system exhibiting biaxial nematic and smectic A phases. The system is uniquely well defined having particles that are both rigid and parallelepipeds. This allows comparison with theory to be especially convincing.

The next paper was by Kocot and Vij, entitled Study of the biaxiality in the nematic phase of liquid crystals in terms of orientational order parameters by infrared spectroscopy [11] in which the authors provide a beautiful account of the development of polarised infrared spectroscopy as a technique to measure scalar order parameters. This focuses on both the theory of the order parameters and its application in experiments involving tripodes and tetrapodes.

The third of these papers was by Weissflog and his co-workers, entitled Banana-calamitic dimers: unexpected mesophase behaviour by variation of the direction of ester linking groups in the bent-core unit [12] and describes the most comprehensive study, to date, of non-symmetric dimers incorporating rod-like and bent mesogenic units and shows how subtle differences in chemical structure can have profound effects on the liquid crystalline and electro-optic properties of these materials.

The fourth paper by Richardson and colleagues entitled Determination of the translational order parameter for smectic liquid crystals using small-angle neutron scattering [13] describes a unique application of coherent, elastic neutron scattering to measure translational order parameters in smectic phases. This paper opens the way to the provision of revealing tests of theories for the smectic phases.

The next paper was by Nastishin and co-workers entitled Double helical defects in smectic A and smectic A* phases [14] which presents a remarkable, rigorous and beautiful investigation of topological defects in liquid crystal phases but written in such a way as to be accessible to a wider audience.

The sixth paper by Lindquist and colleagues entitled Gravitational field-induced orientational transition of aligned nematic liquid crystals [15] presents a fascinating account of a gravitationally induced orientational transition and changes in birefringence and suggests this may be used to enhance the sensitivity of liquid-crystal-based chemical and biological sensors.

The final paper by Gorkunov and Osipov was entitled On the measurement of the orientational order parameters in biaxial liquid crystals using the polarised infrared technique [16] in which the authors treat this complex issue in such a way as to providea valuable road map for experimentalists working in the area of characterising biaxial phases using polarised infrared measurements.

I would like to thank everyone who submitted their work for publication in Liquid Crystals during 2010 and the Selection Committee for all their hard work in choosing the 2010 Luckhurst–Samulski Prize winner. In a short space of time, the Luckhurst–Samulski Prize has become one of the major awards in liquid crystal science and although the 2011 competition is already well underway, it is not too late for you to submit your work for consideration.

Figure 1. Geoffrey Luckhurst presenting the 2010 Luckhurst–Samulski Prize to Antal Jákli at ECLC 2011 in Maribor, Slovenia.

Corrie Imrie

Editor

Chemistry

University of Aberdeen