Applications nonchiral smectics

In chiral-racemic mixtures, the magnitude of Pg varies essentially linearly with the enantiomeric excess. Important for applications is the more general case of a mixture of a nonchiral smectic-C host with a chiral dopant. The relation between Pg and the concentration of the chiral dopant in such mix-... 

The synthesis of nonchiral smectic liquid crystals is a broad topic for discussion, however, it can be divided into subsections in two different ways. For example, smectic systems can be split into metallomesogens and nonmetallomesogens, alternatively, they can be divided into materials for (1) meso-phase structure elucidation and classification [ 1 ], (2) property-structure correlations [2] and (3) host systems for ferroelectric and antiferroelectric mixtures. In the following sections template structures used for the synthesis of smectic materials will be described, followed by discussions of the syntheses of materials that have extensive histories in the elucidation of smectic phase structures, and finally of the syntheses of smectogens that are useful in applications. 

The symmetry approach to ferroelectricity in liquid crystals can be realized not only for individual substances but also for multicomponent systems. For low-molar-mass ferroelectric liquid crystals, most applications use LC mixtures with two main components a nonchiral matrix providing the tilted smectic structure and a chiral dopant [7]. As for the preparation of FLCPs, mixing of a smectic C polymer with a chiral dopant also results in a ferroelectric chiral smectic system [74]. Japanese authors [75,76] have carried out systematic studies on mixing tilted smectic polymers with low-molar-mass ferroelectric liquid crystals. 

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