Geometric frustration in twist-bend nematic droplets

Abstract

Liquid crystals formed of bent-core molecules are exotic materials that exhibit the twist-bend nematic phase. This arises when an energetic preference for nonzero local bend distortion is accommodated via twist in the texture, resulting in properties synonymous with both smectics and cholesterics. Here we describe how the frustration inherent to the twist-bend phase can be exacerbated by confinement and boundary anchoring. Using a combination of numerical simulations, topological and geometric analysis, we catalogue the metastable textures that arise in spherical twist-bend droplets with a radial anchoring as the two key parameters—the molecular cone angle and the ratio between the pitch length and droplet radius—are varied. This form of confinement is known to produce a wide variety of topologically and geometrically complex metastable states in cholesterics. We find that twist-bend nematic droplets are no different, exhibiting a variety of complex layered states, defect constellations, and Hopfions. However, whilst many of the structures and defect configurations that we observe are equivalent to their cholesteric counterparts, they are geometrically very distinct, in part due to the absence of chirality.