American Institute of Physics, Applied Physics Letters, 11(96), p. 113503
DOI: 10.1063/1.3357420
Full text: Unavailable
Due to flexoelectricity, a cholesteric liquid crystal unidirectionally aligned in a sandwich cell, with its helix lying parallel to the confining cell substrates, exhibit a flexoelectro-optic response when subjected to an electric field applied perpendicular to the helix axis. The clarity of the flexoelectro-optic response is dependent on the quality of the uniformly lying helix texture of the cholesteric which often is difficult to achieve. Herein, a method for alignment of a short pitch cholesteric in such a texture by means of a periodic surface anchoring condition with periodicity matching that of the cholesteric liquid crystal is described.