Fast Carrier Mobility in Smectic A Phase of a Liquid Crystalline Compound Containing an Imidazolium Salt

Abstract

A smectogenic 1,3-bis(4-decyloxyphenyl)-3H-imidazol-1-ium trifluoromethane sulfonates (1) was studied on the drift mobility of carriers by a Time-Of-Flight (TOF) technique. The transient photocurrent decay curves were clearly observed for the positive electrode illumination and the transit times could be detected to indicate the mobility in the smectic A (SmA) phase is on the order of 10⁻³ cm² V⁻¹ s⁻¹. This carrier mobility is too fast if it is a reflection of ionic transport in this system and is more easily explained on the basis of electronic charge hopping process.

Keywords:

• Carrier mobility
• imidazolium salt
• ionic liquid
• liquid crystal
• organic semiconductor

This work in part was in part carried out by the financial support from Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology (Grant-in-aid:Super-Hierarchical Structure).