Molecular Orientation Change Nearby Topological Defects Observed by Photo-Induced Polarization/Phase Microscopy
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- Haruka Sakanoue
- Department of Applied Chemistry, Chuo University, Tokyo 112-8551, Japan
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- Woon Yong Sohn
- Department of Applied Chemistry, Chuo University, Tokyo 112-8551, Japan
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- Kenji Katayama
- Department of Applied Chemistry, Chuo University, Tokyo 112-8551, Japan
Description
Topological defects in liquid crystals (LCs) have been intensively studied and intentionally generated in an organized way recently because they could control the alignment and motion of LCs. We studied how the topological defects could change the molecular orientation/alignment from the observation of photo-induced orientation change of a photo-responsive LC. The photo-induced dynamics was observed by an LED-induced time-resolved polarization/phase microscopy with white light illumination. From the color image sequence, we found that the molecular orientation change started from the topological defects and the orientation change propagated as a pair of defects and was connected, and further disordering was induced as a next step after the initial orientation change finished.
Journal
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- ACS Omega
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ACS Omega 4 (9), 13936-13942, 2019-08-14
American Chemical Society (ACS)
