Berlin 2015 – wissenschaftliches Programm

Bereiche | Tage | Auswahl | Suche | Aktualisierungen | Downloads | Hilfe

CPP: Fachverband Chemische Physik und Polymerphysik

CPP 45: P10: Colloids and Complex Liquids

CPP 45.11: Poster

Mittwoch, 18. März 2015, 10:00–13:00, Poster A

Fundamental Measure Theory for Liquid Crystals — •René Wittmann, Matthieu Marechal, and Klaus Mecke — Institut für Theoretische Physik, Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg, Staudtstraße 7, 91058 Erlangen, Germany

Fluids of hard spherocylinders exhibit a rich phase behavior including isotropic, nematic and smectic-A phases. A density functional for anisotropic hard bodies can be constructed in terms of tensorial weighted densities (FMT) which depend on geometry and position of only one single oriented particle [1]. Within a new geometric method to derive the exact low-density functional we introduce a mixed measure of two bodies which can be expanded to the original tensor series. We compare this Fundamental Mixed Measure Theory (FMMT) to approximated results and Monte-Carlo simulations.

The isotropic–nematic interfacial tension remarkably improves on earlier, only qualitatively correct predictions for director dependence and density profile [2]. For the first time we obtain a phase diagram of hard spherocylinders, including a stable smectic phase [3], which can be quantitatively compared to simulations. To verify the consitency of the different FMT approaches, we study the the phase behavior of parallel spherocylinders and the elasticity of the nematic phase analytically.

[1] H. Hansen-Goos and K. Mecke, Phys. Rev. Lett. 102, 018302 (2009).

[2] R. Wittmann and K. Mecke, J. Chem. Phys. 140, 104703 (2014).

[3] R. Wittmann, M. Marechal and K. Mecke, J. Chem. Phys. 141, 064103 (2014).