| Issue |
EPL
Volume 100, Number 6, December 2012
|
|
|---|---|---|
| Article Number | 66005 | |
| Number of page(s) | 6 | |
| Section | Condensed Matter: Structural, Mechanical and Thermal Properties | |
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1209/0295-5075/100/66005 | |
| Published online | 09 January 2013 | |
Confined chiral polymer nematics: Ordering and spontaneous condensation
1 Department of Physics, Faculty of Mathematics and Physics, University of Ljubljana SI-1000 Ljubljana, Slovenia, EU
2 Department of Theoretical Physics, J. Stefan Institute - SI-1000 Ljubljana, Slovenia, EU
3 Department of Physics, University of Massachusetts - Amherst, MA 01003, USA
Received: 12 October 2012
Accepted: 27 November 2012
We investigate condensation of a long confined chiral nematic polymer inside a spherical enclosure, mimicking condensation of DNA inside a viral capsid. The Landau-de Gennes nematic free-energy Ansatz appropriate for nematic polymers allows us to study the condensation process in detail with different boundary conditions at the enclosing wall that simulate repulsive and attractive polymer-surface interactions. By increasing the chirality, we observe a transformation of the toroidal condensate into a closed surface with an increasing genus, in some respects akin to the ordered domain formation observed in cryo-microscopy of bacteriophages.
PACS: 61.30.Pq – Microconfined liquid crystals: droplets, cylinders, randomly confined liquid crystals, polymer dispersed liquid crystals, and porous systems / 61.30.Vx – Polymer liquid crystals / 61.30.Jf – Defects in liquid crystals
© EPLA, 2012
Current usage metrics show cumulative count of Article Views (full-text article views including HTML views, PDF and ePub downloads, according to the available data) and Abstracts Views on Vision4Press platform.
Data correspond to usage on the plateform after 2015. The current usage metrics is available 48-96 hours after online publication and is updated daily on week days.
Initial download of the metrics may take a while.