Nematic liquid crystals in a rectangular confinement: solution landscape, and bifurcation

DOI10.1137/21M1447404MaRDI QIDQ5044542zbMATH OpenOpenAlexFDO

Authors Baoming Shi, Yucen Han, Lei Zhang

Publication date 1 November 2022

Published in SIAM Journal on Applied Mathematics (Search for Journal in Brave)

Full work available at URL https://arxiv.org/abs/2109.10318

zbMATH Keywords

bifurcationLandau-de Gennes modelnematic liquid crystalssaddle pointsolution landscape

Mathematics Subject Classification ID

Bifurcations in context of PDEs (35B32) Critical points of functionals in context of PDEs (e.g., energy functionals) (35B38) PDEs in connection with fluid mechanics (35Q35) Integro-partial differential equations (35R09) Dynamical systems in numerical analysis (37N30) Optimality conditions for minimax problems (49K35) Finite difference methods for initial value and initial-boundary value problems involving PDEs (65M06) Numerical problems in dynamical systems (65P99) Liquid crystals (76A15)

Abstract: We study the solution landscape and bifurcation diagrams of nematic liquid crystals confined on a rectangle, using a reduced two-dimensional Landau--de Gennes framework in terms of two geometry-dependent variables: half short edge length $lambda$ and aspect ratio $b$. First, we analytically prove that, for any $b$ with a small enough $lambda$ or for a large enough $b$ with a fixed domain size, there is a unique stable solution that has two line defects on the opposite short edges. Second, we numerically construct solution landscapes by varying $lambda$ and $b$, and report a novel X state, which emerges from saddle-node bifurcation and serves as the parent state in such a solution landscape. Various new classes are then found among these solution landscapes, including the X class, the S class, and the L class. By tracking the Morse indices of individual solutions, we present bifurcation diagrams for nematic equilibria, thus illustrating the emergence mechanism of critical points and several effects of geometrical anisotropy on confined defect patterns.

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Cited in

(26)

• Solution landscapes in nematic microfluidics
• Energy landscape analysis for two-phase multi-component NVT flash systems by using ETD type high-index saddle dynamics
• Order Reconstruction for Nematics on Squares and Hexagons: A Landau--de Gennes Study
• A Reduced Study for Nematic Equilibria on Two-Dimensional Polygons
• Stressed states and persistent defects in confined nematic elastica
• scientific article; zbMATH DE number 4092876 (Why is no real title available?)
• scientific article; zbMATH DE number 671978 (Why is no real title available?)
• Nematic liquid crystals on curved surfaces: a thin film limit
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• Bifurcation analysis in a frustrated nematic cell
• Solution landscape of a reduced Landau-de Gennes model on a hexagon
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• A diffuse-interface Landau-de Gennes model for free boundary problems in the theory of nematic liquid crystals
• A modified Landau-de Gennes theory for smectic liquid crystals: phase transitions and structural transitions
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