Swelling of liquid crystalline polymer brush in nematic solvent studied by surface force measurement

摘要

Control the orientation, strength and pretilt angle of anchoring of liquid crystals (LC) on a surface plays an essential role in liquid crystal devices such as LC display, photonic devices and liquid crystal-based sensors. These properties of anchoring of LCs are strongly influenced by the surface chemistry. Recently P. Nealey has developed a new method to precisely control the anchoring behavior based on the side-chain LC polymer brushes1. The strength and pretilt angle of anchoring can be controlled by changing the grafting density of the polymer brush on the surface. Possible schematics of polymer brush are shown in figure 1.