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Polymer Stabilized Nematic Liquid Crystals |  |
Applications of dispersions containing polymers and liquid crystals are growing in importance. The preceding section on Polymer Dispersed Liquid Crystals (PDLC) dealt with a higher polymer concentration range, above about 20-wt %. In display applications, these materials present problems with hazy images for obliquely incident light. Rapid development is occurring in the low polymer concentration range (10 weight % or less) because of the ability to form polymer networks which stabilize liquid crystal textures throughout the bulk of a device and improve its electro-optical performance, as discussed later. Just as in the case of PDLCs, ALCOM researchers have played leading roles in the discovery, investigation and development of these polymer stabilized liquid crystalline (PSLC) materials for use in devices (e.g. Doane, Chien, Yang, Bos – see chapters 1, 4, 5, 11, 12, 13 of Liquid Crystals in Complex Geometries, edited by GP Crawford & S. Zumer (Taylor & Frances, London. 1996) subsequently referred to as Crawford & Zumer, 1996). Here, we will consider stabilization in nematic liquid crystalline materials first and then, in the next section, cholesterics where much of the current development effort is focused.
You will find that these topics are treated in more detail than most others because they represent relatively new concepts which involve some current ALCOM research.
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Polymer Stabilized Nematic Liquid Crystals | |