Issue 6, 2020

Supramolecular liquid crystals exhibiting a chiral twist-bend nematic phase

Abstract

A selection of novel, chiral supramolecular liquid crystals formed by hydrogen-bonding are reported and their phase properties characterised by polarised optical microscopy, X-ray diffraction and resonant soft X-ray diffraction. Their behaviour is compared to that of their achiral analogues. The binary mixture of the bent-shaped, non-mesogenic H-bond acceptor 1OB6OS and chiral H-bond donor (S)-(2-Me)4OBA exhibits chiral nematic (N*) and chiral smectic A (SmA*) phases. Doping the twist-bend nematogenic (NTB) complex 1OB6OS:4OBA with (S)-(2-Me)4OBA in ternary mixtures induces a transition from the N* phase to the chiral twist-bend nematic phase N*TB, the first example seen in a supramolecular liquid crystal. The binary mixture of CB6OS and (S)-(2-Me)4OBA exhibits N* and N*TB phases, with the helical structure of the latter having a periodicity of approximately 2 complex lengths (∼8 nm). The nature of the hydrogen bond is reversed in a binary mixture of the bent-shaped, twist-bend nematogen CB6OBA with (S)-(2-Me)4OBA, and this exhibits the phase sequence N*–N*TB–SmC*–SmX.

Graphical abstract: Supramolecular liquid crystals exhibiting a chiral twist-bend nematic phase

Supplementary files

Article information

Article type
Paper
Submitted
12 mei 2020
Accepted
01 jul 2020
First published
02 jul 2020
This article is Open Access
Creative Commons BY-NC license

Mater. Adv., 2020,1, 1622-1630

Supramolecular liquid crystals exhibiting a chiral twist-bend nematic phase

R. Walker, D. Pociecha, M. Salamończyk, J. M. D. Storey, E. Gorecka and C. T. Imrie, Mater. Adv., 2020, 1, 1622 DOI: 10.1039/D0MA00302F

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