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Smectic rheology

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Abstract

We have studied the oscillatory shear response of three thermotropic smectic-A liquid crystalline materials with no external aligning field (other than the necessary presence of rheometer plates). Two are polymers (one main-chain and one side-chain) and the other is a small molecule smectic. All three exhibit the classical linear response to oscillatory shear characteristic of a viscoelastic solid at sufficiently small strain amplitudes and frequencies. However, for strain amplitudes exceeding a small critical value, these materials exhibit a strongly nonlinear response to strain, which is characterized in detail. While the low-strain moduli and the critical strain of the three smectics are considerably different, the nonlinear response has some universal character which is presumably related to the low energy for the formation of defects in smectic liquid crystals.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Materials Science and Engineering, The Pennsylvania State University, 16802, University Park, Pennsylvania, USA

    Ralph H. Colby

  2. Department of Materials Science and Engineering, Cornell University, 14853-1501, Ithaca, New York, USA

    Christopher K. Ober

  3. Imaging Research and Advanced Development, Eastman Kodak Company, 14650-2109, Rochester, New York, USA

    Jeffery R. Gillmor, Richard W. Connelly & Tony Duong

  4. Dipartimento di Chimica e Chimica Industriale, Università degli Studi di Pisa, Via Risorgimento 35, 56100, Pisa, Italy

    Giancarlo Galli

  5. Dipartimento di Chimica Industriale e dei Materiali, Università di Bologna, Viale Risorgimento 4, 40136, Bologna, Italy

    Michele Laus

Authors
  1. Ralph H. Colby
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  2. Christopher K. Ober
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  3. Jeffery R. Gillmor
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  4. Richard W. Connelly
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  5. Tony Duong
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  6. Giancarlo Galli
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  7. Michele Laus
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Colby, R.H., Ober, C.K., Gillmor, J.R. et al. Smectic rheology. Rheol Acta 36, 498–504 (1997). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00368127

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00368127

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