Modulated Phases in Liquid Crystals

P. F. Bienzobaz, Na Xu, Anders W. Sandvik

Published 2017-04-26Version 1

This work is dedicated to the study of the Maier-Saupe model in the presence of competing interactions. The competition induces modulated structures in the phase diagram which, in the case of liquid crystals, can be identified as cholesteric (modulated) phases. Using a mean-field approach and Monte Carlo simulations, we show that the proposed model exhibits isotropic and nematic phases, and also a series of cholesteric phases that meet at a multicritical point; a Lifshitz point. Though the Monte Carlo and mean-field phase diagrams show some quantitative disagreements, the Monte Carlo simulations corroborate the general behavior found within the mean-field approximation.