Chirality in Liquid Crystals: from Microscopic Origins to Macroscopic Structure

TL;DR

This paper reviews recent advances in understanding how molecular chirality influences the macroscopic structures of liquid crystals, including new phase proposals and the connection between microscopic geometry and macroscopic properties.

Contribution

It introduces a new equilibrium phase of twisted ropes in chiral liquid crystals and explores the link between molecular chirality and macroscopic structures.

Findings

Chiral geometry affects macroscopic liquid crystal phases.

Proposal of a new lattice phase of twisted ropes.

Insights into chiral structure in columnar systems.

Abstract

Molecular chirality leads to a wonderful variety of equilibrium structures, from the simple cholesteric phase to the twist-grain-boundary phases, and it is responsible for interesting and technologically important materials like ferroelectric liquid crystals. This paper will review some recent advances in our understanding of the connection between the chiral geometry of individual molecules and the important phenomenological parameters that determine macroscopic chiral structure. It will then consider chiral structure in columnar systems and propose a new equilibrium phase consisting of a regular lattice of twisted ropes.