Alignment Control of Columnar Liquid Crystals for Uniformly Homeotropic Domain with Circularly Polarized Infrared Irradiation

Abstract

In this study, the alignment change with circularly polarized infrared irradiation for columnar mesophase was investigated for a liquid crystalline triphenylene derivative in order to get uniform domain with homeotropic alignment of columnar liquid crystal.

It was found that circularly polarized infrared irradiation provides alignment change to form new domain with uniformly homeotropic (“face-on”) alignment and this phenomena is by way of the excitation of the selected vibrational mode of a chemical bond. The results strongly imply that the infrared irradiation is a possible technique for device fabrication by use of columnar liquid crystalline semiconductors.

Keywords:

• alignment control
• circularly polarized light
• discotic liquid crystal
• infrared

Acknowledgments

The authors gratefully acknowledge the financial support of Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI). This work is partly supported by Industrial Technology Research Grant Program in '03 from New Energy and Industrial Technology Development Organization (NEDO) of Japan. The authors thank Mr. S. Kuma, and Mr. T. Marusaki for their support in operating the FEL facilities. We also thank Mr. S. Shinohara and Mr. S. Okamoto for their support in preparing the materials.