Stable smectic phase in suspensions of polydisperse colloidal platelets with identical thickness

Physical Review E - Statistical, Nonlinear, and Soft Matter Physics

Volumn 80, Issue 4, 2009, Pages

  Sun, Dazhi ^a   Sue, Hung Jue ^a   Cheng, Zhengdong ^a   Martínez Ratón, Yuri ^b   Velasco, Enrique ^c  

^a Texas AandM University   (United States)

^b UNIVERSIDAD CARLOS III DE MADRID   (Spain)

^c INSTITUTO NICOLÁS CABRERA   (Spain)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

DENSITY FUNCTIONAL THEORY; NEMATIC LIQUID CRYSTALS; PHASE EQUILIBRIA; PLATELETS; POLYDISPERSITY; SMECTIC LIQUID CRYSTALS; SUSPENSIONS (FLUIDS); X RAY DIFFRACTION; ZIRCONIUM COMPOUNDS;

AQUEOUS SUSPENSIONS; COLLOIDAL PLATELETS; DISCOTIC LIQUID CRYSTAL; ISOTROPIC-NEMATIC TRANSITIONS; NEMATIC AND SMECTIC ORDERING; POLYDISPERSE SUSPENSION; THEORETICAL APPROACH; ZIRCONIUM PHOSPHATE;

HIGH RESOLUTION TRANSMISSION ELECTRON MICROSCOPY;

EID: 70350523757     PISSN: 15393755     EISSN: 15502376     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevE.80.041704     Document Type: Article

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17. Further theoretical calculations with attractive forces (not shown) indicate that the transition changes to first order when the system is polydisperse (orientational degrees of freedom might have some additional effect on the transition).
18. Note that the smectic volume fraction φS the and period d/ Leff at the spinodal point could both decrease due to additional attractive, short-ranged forces plus long-ranged, repulsive forces; in this case Leff /L would increase and, consequently, φS would be lower than our estimate (0.108) using a purely repulsive potential.