Publication: Enhancement by polydispersity of the biaxial nematic phase in a mixture of hard rods and plates
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ISSN: 0031-9007 (Print)
ISSN: 1079-7114 (Online)
Publication date
2002-10-28
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The American Physical Society
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Abstract
The phase diagram of a polydisperse mixture of uniaxial rodlike and platelike hard parallelepipeds is determined for aspect ratios κ=5 and 15. All particles have equal volume, and polydispersity is introduced in a highly symmetric way. The corresponding binary mixture is known to have a biaxial phase for κ=15, but to be unstable against demixing into two uniaxial nematics for κ=5. The phase diagram for κ=15 is qualitatively similar to that of the binary mixture, regardless of the amount of polydispersity, while for κ=5 a sufficient amount of polydispersity stabilizes the biaxial phase. This provides clues for designing an experiment to observe this long searched biaxial phase.
Description
4 pages, 2 figures.-- PACS nrs.: 64.70.Md, 61.20.Gy, 64.75.+g.-- ArXiv pre-print available at: http://arxiv.org/abs/cond-mat/0206576
Final publisher version available Open Access at: http://gisc.uc3m.es/~cuesta/papers-year.html
Final publisher version available Open Access at: http://gisc.uc3m.es/~cuesta/papers-year.html
Keywords
[PACS] Transitions in liquid crystals, [PACS] Theory and models of liquid structure, [PACS] Phase equilibria
Bibliographic citation
Physical Review Letters, 89, 185701 (2002)