Spontaneous formation of cubic phases: a molecular dynamics study for soft repulsive spherocylinders

ABSTRACT

Spontaneous formation of structures with ‘cubic symmetry’ is observed by molecular dynamics simulation. We show that many phases with cubic symmetry with planes of edge dislocations appear when the Sm layers are allowed to break up at relatively low pressures. The phases obtained can be interpreted as bend-grain-boundary phases consisting of edge dislocations, the counterpart of the twist-grain-boundary phase consisting of screw dislocations.

GRAPHICAL ABSTRACT

KEYWORDS:

• Liquid crystals
• cubic symmetry
• molecular dynamics
• dislocation
• soft repulsive spherocylinders

Acknowledgments

KMA is thankful to iCFD for general support. This work was supported in part by Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (C) (20K05619) for SK, and Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (B) (21H01046) for KS.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.