Light Scattering by Thin Nematic Liquid Crystal Films

Abstract

The scattering of light by thin nematic liquid crystal films is studied. The distribution of fluctuation wavevectors relevant to the scattering is peaked around the difference between the wavevectors of the scattered and the incident light ray. The width is inversely proportional to the film thickness. Furthermore, only a discrete set of fluctuation wavevectors is allowed due to restrictions imposed by the boundary conditions. In the case of weak anchoring the relaxation time is a linear function of the thickness for sufficiently small film thicknesses. Similar results may be expected for other confined nematic systems, e.g. for nematics confined to porous media.