Bent-core alignment layers

The difficulty of aligning bent-core liquid crystals at a surface is addressed from three directions: We form Langmuir monolayers of bent core molecules at the air-water interface, and explore their orientation and packing. We transfer these films by Langmuir-Schaefer techniques to a solid surface, and test them for the alignment of bulk liquid crystal. We use atomistic molecular dynamics simulations to directly probe possible molecular orientation at the water surface, for comparison with experiments. We find that relatively small changes in the bent-core molecule affect both the stability of the films and their ability to promote alignment within liquid crystal cells.