Liquid Crystals for Advanced Technologies

Liquid crystals have emerged as a class of organic materials with potential applications to optics, photonics and optoelectronics. Although a large number of liquid crystals have been discovered or synthesized, fundamental understanding of structure-property relationships at the molecular level is still lacking. Regardless, liquid-crystalline materials have found use in many areas of technology and their scope has been extended with the development of liquid-crystalline polymers, elastomers and composite systems. In addition, emerging advanced technologies, such as flat-panel displays, optical computing and communications, and imaging will call for improved materials as well as novel multifunctional materials. This book presents recent advances in both the fundamental science and application-specific research of LC technology. New synthetic approaches are featured, as are developments in novel glass forming, low-molecular-weight liquid crystals and their utility in both display and optical applications. Topics include: PDLC composites; display and optical applications of LC-based compounds; modelling; rheology; chiral smectics and thermosets.