Surface polarity SSFLCs

Surface Stabilized Ferroelectric Liquid Crystals (SSFLC)116 Here all three vectors of spontaneous polarization (Fs) are initially aligned by surface effects in thin cells (ca 2 pm). The switchability is due to 180° rotation of the Fs vectors on a cone. 

Fig. 1.4 Sketch of the surfaee-stabilized feiroelectric liquid crystal (SSFLC) cell structure. Due to the surface-stabilization, the helical structure of the SmC phase is unwound as only two director orientations on the tilt eone can be realized. These two director states correspond to either UP or DOWN polarization (redrawn after [15])...

The molecular orientational states of the SSFLCs have been analyzed by polarizing microspectroscopy and optical simulation. The X-ray studies indicated that the chevron layer structure is determined by the bulk properties of the FLC, but the molecular orientation in the smectic layer is strongly influenced by the surface properties. The effect of surface pretilt angle on the molecular orientation and the optical properties of SSFLCs have been studied by the optical simulation based on the molecular orientational models. 

The polarity of the alignment layer surface does not have much influence on alignment phenomena for nematic liquid crj talline materials. However, in the case of FLC materials, the polarity of the alignment layer surface shows an important effect. This is because the interaction between the spontaneous polarization and the polarity of the surface becomes important. This matter has been approached theoretically [27]. The stable director orientation in the SSFLC device was determined by minimizing the total free energy of the surfaces and the bulk elastic distortion as functions of cell thickness, cone angle, helical pitch, elastic constant and surface interaction coefficient. Because of the tendency of the direction of the spontaneous polarization to point either into or out of the substrate surface due to polar surface interaction, the director of the molecules twists from the top to the bottom surface. Therefore, the uniform state can only be stabilized in the case of a small surface interaction coefficient. 

In the case of SSFLCs, asymmetry of the polarities of the top and bottom surfaces determines whether the cell shows bistability, a twisted state or monostability. Because the 7a value does not change greatly for the surfaces of different polymers, the asymmetry of the cell can be evaluated by the difference, A7p... 

Figure 5.29 (a) Bookshelf geometry in a surface-stabilized ferroelectric liquid crystal (SSFLC) display showing two states of polarization. Here the surface acts to unwind the helix, (b) Chevron geometry in an FLC. This disturbs the switchable polarization in the bookshelf geometry... 

The Clark-Lagerwall Effect. This effect is observed in thin surface-stabilized FLC (SSFLC) cells where the smectic layers are perpendicular to the substrates, the thickness is less than the helical pitch (delectric field of opposite polarity switches the direction of the spontaneous polarization between the UP and... 

In helically modulated SmC liquid crystals, the bulk polarization is vanishingly small. The helicity can be unwound by an external field applied parallel to the smectic layers. It can also be unwound by surface effects if the samples are sufficiently thin (thickness pitch), leading to the so-called surface-stabilized ferroelectric liquid crystal (SSFLC) with a nonvanishing macroscopic polarization. 

The chiral smectic C phase has the unique property of a dipole perpendicular to the tilt direction of the mesogens. This results from the lack of a mirror plane due to the chirality of the mesogens. However, a macroscopic polarization is not observed, as the lilt direction changes from layer to layer to form a helical superstructure. The twist can be unwound by surface alignment and electrical fields in a so-called surface-stabilized ferroelectric liquid crystal (SSFLC) cell. ... 

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