Lyotropic Lamellar Phase Doped with a Nematic Phase of Magnetic Nanorods

TL;DR

This study creates a hybrid lyotropic lamellar phase doped with magnetic nanorods, demonstrating controllable nanorod orientation and altered order parameters through thermal and magnetic manipulation, revealing interplay between lamellar and nematic phases.

Contribution

It introduces a novel hybrid mesophase combining lamellar and nematic orders with magnetic nanorods, showing controllable alignment and interaction effects.

Findings

Nanorods can be aligned using magnetic fields.

The hybrid phase exhibits altered nematic and lamellar orders.

Thermal annealing enables high alignment quality.

Abstract

We report the elaboration of a hybrid mesophase combining the lamellar order of a lyotropic system of nonionic surfactant and the nematic order of a concentrated solution of inorganic nanorods confined between the surfactant layers. Highly aligned samples of this mesophase can be obtained by thermal annealing, and the orientation of the nanorods is readily controlled with a magnetic field. High-resolution synchrotron X-ray scattering and polarized optical microscopy show that, compared to their isolated counterparts, both the nematic and lamellar orders are altered, demonstrating their interplay.