Stability Against the Odds: the Case of Chromonic Liquid Crystals

DOI10.1007/S00332-022-09833-6MaRDI QIDQ6394530arXivFDO

Authors Silvia Paparini, Epifanio G. Virga

Publication date 23 March 2022

Published in arXiv

Full work available at URL https://doi.org/10.1007/S00332-022-09833-6

Mathematics Subject Classification ID

Liquid crystals (76A15)

arXiv classification

cond-mat.soft math-ph math.MP

Abstract: The ground state of chromonic liquid crystals, as revealed by a number of recent experiments, is quite different from that of ordinary nematic liquid crystals: it is twisted instead of uniform. The common explanation provided for this state within the classical elastic theory of Frank demands that one Ericksen's inequality is violated. Since in general such a violation makes Frank's elastic free-energy functional unbounded below, the question arises as to whether the twisted ground state can be locally stable. We answer this question in the affirmative. In reaching this conclusion, a central role is played by the specific boundary conditions imposed in the experiments on the boundary of rigid containers and by a general formula that we derive here for the second variation of Frank's elastic free energy.

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