Polymerisation in Liquid Crystalline Phase

In the second type of reaction, we polymerise a monomer incorporated into a lyotropic liquid crystalline structure. Very few studies of this kind have been carried out, owing to the complexity of these multicomponent systems. The study of fluctuating membranes and interfaces is at present a subject of great interest to physicists. If solid membranes can be obtained (for example, by polymerisation of lamellar phases), this should lead to better understanding of two-dimensional systems. 

The first study concerns acrylamide polymerisation in the aqueous layer of lyotropic phases with various symmetries, viz. lamellar, cubic and hexagonal [6.21]. Similarities between X-ray spectra before and after polymerisation confirm that the strncture is preserved during reaction. One condition here is 

---