Relation between static short-range order and dynamic heterogeneities in a nanoconfined liquid crystal

TL;DR

This study investigates how static short-range order influences dynamic heterogeneities in a nanoconfined liquid crystal, revealing a close relationship between static order growth and dynamic correlation length across temperature variations.

Contribution

It demonstrates a direct link between static short-range order and dynamic heterogeneity in a confined liquid crystal, providing insights into static-dynamic correlations in soft matter.

Findings

Dynamic correlation length increases with static order growth.

Temperature affects the extent of dynamic heterogeneity.

Static order and dynamic heterogeneity are closely related in nanoconfined systems.

Abstract

We analyze the molecular dynamics heterogeneity of the liquid crystal 4-n-octyl-4'-cyanobiphenyl nanoconfined in porous silicon. We show that the temperature dependence of the dynamic correlation length ?wall, which measures the distance over which a memory of the interfacial slowing down of the molecular dynamics persists, is closely related to the growth of the short-range static order arising from quenched random fields. More generally, this result may also shed some light on the connection between static and dynamic heterogeneities in a wide class of condensed and soft matter systems.