Photoalignment guided order evolution of liquid crystals
Liquid crystals exhibit unique orientational and positional orders,granting them distinct physical properties that play a crucial role in the realm of condensed soft matter.The continuous symmetry breaking in ordered liquid crystal structures leads to the emergent of topological defects.The transformative mechanisms during phase transitions and ordered controlunder external fields have attracted intensive attentions.By manipulating the spatial scale,boundary conditions,and external field of the systems,liquid crystal molecules demonstrate diverse self-assembly behaviors during different thermodynamic processes,accompanied by the appearance of various topological defects,towards achieving the minimization of the system's free energy.However,further exploration on the ordered control and dynamic evolution of topological defects during liquid crystal phase transitions,the controlled transition behaviors and mechanisms under external field,as well as the applications of topological defects is highly required.This review presents the latestworks conducted by our group,who utilizes photoalignment technique to achieve high-precision programmable two-dimensional planar anchoring designs.Through guiding the three-dimensional arrangement of liquid crystal molecules via a two-dimensional photoalignment layer,the controlled and ordered large-area topological defects under different phases are achieved successfully.Leveraging the Landau-de Gennes theory,the research discloses the mechanisms of topological defects during phase transitions and explores the underlying principles,significantly enriching our understanding on self-assembly of ordered systems and paving the way for applications of topological defects.
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