Title:	Simple molecular model for ferroelectric nematic liquid crystals exhibited by small rodlike mesogens
Authors:	Madhusudana, N.V.
Issue Date:	Jul-2021
Publisher:	American Physical Society
Citation:	Physical Review E, 2021, Vol.104, p014704
Abstract:	Nematic liquid crystals (NLCs) are the prime example of a liquid medium with an apolar orientational order. In the past couple of years, the ferroelectric nematic (FN) phase has been discovered in some compounds with small rodlike molecules with large longitudinal dipole moments and very restricted chemical structures, as the temperature is lowered from the NLC. We propose a simple model in which the molecules are idealized as cylindrical rods with longitudinal surface charge density waves. The usually strong electrostatic inter-rod interactions favoring antiparallel structures are shown to be subdued inmagnitude, and those of parallel structures enhanced, by reducing the amplitudes of the half-waves at both ends of the rods. By introducing an additional increased amplitude of one interior wave, the energy per rod of a cluster of molecules with a pseudohexagonal order is shown to favor the ferroelectric order compared to the antiparallel order, below some value of the inter-rod separation. The model broadly accounts for the restriction in molecular structures for a compound to exhibit the FN phase. It is suggested that the weakly first-order nature of the NLC to FN transition arises from a coupling of the polar order and the density of the medium.
Description:	Restricted Access.
URI:	http://hdl.handle.net/2289/7811
ISSN:	2470-0053 (Online) 2470-0045
Alternative Location:	https://ui.adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/2021PhRvE.104a4704M/abstract http://dx.doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevE.104.014704
Copyright:	2021 American Physical Society
Appears in Collections:	Research Papers (SCM)

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