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Monday, July 25, 2011

Temperature and Confinement Effect on Interparticle Force in Nematic Colloids

Noboru Kondo, Yasutaka Iwashita & Yasuyuki Kimura
We experimentally studied the interparticle force between two colloidal particles with point defects in a nematic liquid crystal. The force F at various temperatures was measured using optical tweezers and with a free release method. The effective elastic constant was evaluated from F using electrostatic analogy of nematic field. At respective temperatures, that is in good agreement with the splay constant obtained by dielectric measurement. The dependence of F on cell thicknesses was also studied in a wedge-type cell. In a thinner cell, the magnitude of F becomes smaller, and F becomes short-ranged.

DOI

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