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Pictures below presents textures of thermotropic, liquid crystal compounds. Texture observations were done using NIKON Eclipse polarizing microscope with LINKAM hot stage.
Figure 1. Picture was taken during the cooling process of liquid crystalline sample in the ITO electrooptic cell with polymer (SE610) homogenous layer (strong rubbing applied) under constant influence of external electric field (sinusoidal wave, 100 Hz, 32 V per micrometer) in the vicinity of phase transition from antiferroelectric Smectic C* phase to crystal. As one can see there is a visible boundary between conducting and non-conducting part of the electrooptic cell and little ovules of crystals which start to sprout in form of colorful ribbon-like paths.
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January 2015 featured LC art LINK
Figure 2. Frozen SmC* phase in room temperature.
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POSTER: XXVIIIth Marian Smoluchowski Symposium on Statistical Physics - Thermodynamics in Nanoscale LINK
SOFT MATTER Calendar 2015
Figure 3. What is astonishing and attractive in this image is a direct manifestation of liquid crystal beauty and emergence. One can see that this "finger-print like" texture with its dizzying array of shades of pomegranate and orange recalls a famous painting made by Vincent Van Gogh called "The Starry Night".
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August 2015 featured LC art LINK