Magnetic susceptibility studies on a ternary lyotropic liquid crystal system

Abstract

We have carried out mass diamagnetic susceptibility studies on (SdS)=decanol= water system for two different concentrations of the constituents namely 41.6=6.6=51.8 wt% and 35.47=7=57.5 wt%. This system exhibits calamitic nematic (Nc), isotropic (I) and hexagonal phases (H) on heating from room temperature. We find the isotropic phase susceptibility is temperature dependent at low temperatures and temperature independent at high temperatures. The susceptibility in the nematic phase of sample 1 is temperature independent while that of sample 2 is temperature dependent. We find marked differences in the diamagnetic anisotropy of these two samples. We infer that this may be related to the difference in the shape of the micelles in these samples. We also report the changes in the nematic phase susceptibility in the sample 1 on dispersing a small amount of carbon nanotubes.