Electro-capillary instability of a nematic-isotropic interface

Patrick Oswald (1)

1 Phys-ENS - Laboratoire de Physique de l'ENS Lyon

We have studied the morphological instability under AC electric field of a nematic-isotropic interface confined between two electrodes set at different temperatures. The electrodes are treated for homeotropic anchoring so that, when the field is increased, the Ericksen elastic stress vanishes. In this limit, the instability resembles that observed in ordinary liquids. However, significant differences were observed.

Keywords: Nematic-isotropic interface; Electro-capillary instability

Domains: Physics [physics]; Condensed Matter [cond-mat]; Soft Condensed Matter [cond-mat.soft]

Patrick Oswald. Electro-capillary instability of a nematic-isotropic interface. EPL - Europhysics Letters, 2010, 90 (1), pp.16005. ⟨10.1209/0295-5075/90/16005⟩. ⟨ensl-00507798⟩