Scientific Achievement
Demonstrated that creating chemically patterned surfaces is a generally applicable method of assembling blue-phase single crystals.
Significance and Impact
Single crystalline blue-phases are preferred over their polycrystalline counterparts for display and sensing applications. We devise a recipe for forming single crystals which is applicable irrespective of the chemistry and complexity of the blue-phase forming materials.
Research Details
- Continuum simulations were used to calculate free energy for different blue-phase lattice orientations on striped chemical patterns consisting of alternating homeotropic and planar regions.
- Predictions from continuum simulations were used to design chemical patterned surfaces.
- Single crystalline blue-phases were formed from three different materials.
- Single crystals were formed from a photopolymerizable formulation; UV curing made the single crystals thermally stable.
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