Jump to main content
Jump to site search
Publishing
Advanced

Issue 23, 2011
Previous Article Next Article

Liquid crystals of aqueous, giant graphene oxide flakes†

Budhadipta Dan,ad   Natnael Behabtu,b   Angel Martinez,d   Julian S. Evans,d   Dmitry V. Kosynkin,c   James M. Tour,c   Matteo Pasquali*bc  and  Ivan I. Smalyukh*def  
Author affiliations

* Corresponding authors

a Department of Physics and Astronomy, 6100 Main Street, Houston, Texas, USA

b Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, 6100 Main Street, Houston, Texas, USA
E-mail: mp@rice.edu

c Department of Chemistry, R. E. Smalley Institute for Nanoscale Science & Technology, Rice University, 6100 Main Street, Houston, Texas, USA

d Department of Physics, 2000 Colorado Ave, Boulder, Colorado, USA
E-mail: ivan.smalyukh@colorado.edu

e Materials Science and Engineering Graduate Program, and Liquid Crystal Materials Research Center, University of Colorado, 2000 Colorado Ave, Boulder, Colorado, USA

f Renewable and Sustainable Energy Institute, University of Colorado and National Renewable Energy Laboratory, Boulder, Colorado, USA

Abstract

We report the observation of liquid crystals formed by giant graphene oxide flakes (aspect ratio above 10 000) suspended in water. As their concentration increases, the flakes undergo transitions from an isotropic dispersion to a biphasic system and then to a discotic nematic liquid crystal. The gel-like liquid crystal displays an unusual defect-free uniform director alignment over hundreds of micrometres. We characterize the nematic order parameter, optical birefringence and elastic properties of this novel mesomorphic system.

Graphical abstract: Liquid crystals of aqueous, giant graphene oxide flakes

Back to tab navigation
Download options Please wait...

Supplementary files

Article information

https://doi.org/10.1039/C1SM06418E
Submitted
25 Jul 2011
Accepted
19 Sep 2011
First published
20 Oct 2011
Soft Matter, 2011,7, 11154-11159
Article type
Paper
Permissions
Request permissions

Liquid crystals of aqueous, giant graphene oxide flakes

B. Dan, N. Behabtu, A. Martinez, J. S. Evans, D. V. Kosynkin, J. M. Tour, M. Pasquali and I. I. Smalyukh, Soft Matter, 2011, 7, 11154
DOI: 10.1039/C1SM06418E

If you are not the author of this article and you wish to reproduce material from it in a third party non-RSC publication you must formally request permission using Copyright Clearance Center. Go to our Instructions for using Copyright Clearance Center page for details.

Authors contributing to RSC publications (journal articles, books or book chapters) do not need to formally request permission to reproduce material contained in this article provided that the correct acknowledgement is given with the reproduced material.

Reproduced material should be attributed as follows:

  • For reproduction of material from NJC:
    Reproduced from Ref. XX with permission from the Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS) and The Royal Society of Chemistry.
  • For reproduction of material from PCCP:
    Reproduced from Ref. XX with permission from the PCCP Owner Societies.
  • For reproduction of material from PPS:
    Reproduced from Ref. XX with permission from the European Society for Photobiology, the European Photochemistry Association, and The Royal Society of Chemistry.
  • For reproduction of material from all other RSC journals and books:
    Reproduced from Ref. XX with permission from The Royal Society of Chemistry.

If the material has been adapted instead of reproduced from the original RSC publication "Reproduced from" can be substituted with "Adapted from".

In all cases the Ref. XX is the XXth reference in the list of references.

If you are the author of this article you do not need to formally request permission to reproduce figures, diagrams etc. contained in this article in third party publications or in a thesis or dissertation provided that the correct acknowledgement is given with the reproduced material.

Reproduced material should be attributed as follows:

  • For reproduction of material from NJC:
    [Original citation] - Reproduced by permission of The Royal Society of Chemistry (RSC) on behalf of the Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS) and the RSC
  • For reproduction of material from PCCP:
    [Original citation] - Reproduced by permission of the PCCP Owner Societies
  • For reproduction of material from PPS:
    [Original citation] - Reproduced by permission of The Royal Society of Chemistry (RSC) on behalf of the European Society for Photobiology, the European Photochemistry Association, and RSC
  • For reproduction of material from all other RSC journals:
    [Original citation] - Reproduced by permission of The Royal Society of Chemistry

If you are the author of this article you still need to obtain permission to reproduce the whole article in a third party publication with the exception of reproduction of the whole article in a thesis or dissertation.

Information about reproducing material from RSC articles with different licences is available on our Permission Requests page.

Social activity

Search articles by author

Spotlight

Advertisements