engleski

Mesophase diversity of bent-shaped dimers driven by enantiomeric purity

The remarkable behaviour of bent-shaped dimers is the spontaneous formation of polar order even without molecular chirality. The first example of such behaviour was provided by the twist-bend nematic phase (NTB) which is characterized by the formation of degenerate helices of opposite handedness. Introducing molecular chirality into bent-shaped molecules provides the additional driving force for the formation of the helical structure. Hence, it is of interest to investigate the competition between spontaneous structural and intrinsic molecular chirality. Our research is focused on the development of bent-shaped dimers including phenyl-3-hydroxy propanoate ester moiety as a source of chirality. Such dimers were synthesized in a racemic and enantiomerically pure form. Both forms exhibit unrelated mesomorphic properties and also small structural changes result in interesting mesophase diversity which will be discussed.

dimers ; liquid crystals ; chirality

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