Preparation and applications of the epoxy resin-based polymer- stabilised cholesteric liquid crystal films with microcracks at the surface

ABSTRACT

Polymer-stabilised cholesteric liquid crystal (PSCLC) films attracted much attention in decoration and anti-counterfeiting. Herein, the PSCLC films were prepared using the mixtures of epoxy monomers through cationic photopolymerisation. The structural colour was tunable by changing the concentration of chiral dopant in the reaction mixture and polymerisation temperature. Due to polymerisation shrinkage, microcracks were formed at the surfaces of the PSCLC films, which originated from the oily streak defects of the CLC mixtures. Colourful patterns were prepared by controlling the polymerisation temperature. In addition, since light can leak out through the microcracks, the tetraphenylethylene-doped patterns can be applied in anti-counterfeiting.

GRAPHICAL ABSTRACT

KEYWORDS:

• Epoxy liquid crystal
• microcrack
• photopolymerisation
• colourful pattern
• thermochroism

Disclosure statement

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

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China [No. 52273212], the Project of Scientific and Technologic Infrastructure of Suzhou [SZS201905], the Key Laboratory of Polymeric Materials Design and Synthesis for Biomedical Function, and the Natural Science Foundation of the Jiangsu Higher Education Institutions of China [20KJA430009].