Chiral and Antichiral Order in Bent-Core Liquid Crystals

TL;DR

This paper models the unusual antichiral order in bent-core liquid crystals using an Ising model, revealing a phase transition between antichiral and chiral states, and suggests experimental ways to study this transition.

Contribution

It introduces a theoretical Ising model to explain antichiral order in bent-core liquid crystals, providing phase diagrams and transition analysis.

Findings

Identifies a second-order phase transition between antichiral and chiral phases.

Maps the liquid crystal behavior onto an Ising model for theoretical analysis.

Suggests experimental methods to observe the phase transition.

Abstract

Recent experiments have found a bent-core liquid crystal in which the layer chirality alternates from layer to layer, giving a racemic or "antichiral" material, even though the molecules are uniformly chiral. To explain this effect, we map the liquid crystal onto an Ising model, analogous to a model for chiral order in polymers. We calculate the phase diagram for this model, and show that it has a second-order phase transition between antichiral order and homogeneous chiral order. We discuss how this transition can be studied by further chemical synthesis or by doping experiments.