A Study on Surface Liquid Crystal Alignment an Anchoring Strangth of Polystyrene Surfaces in Nematic Liquid Crystal

네마틱액정에 있어서 폴리스타이렌막의 표면액정배향효과 및 결합강도에 관한 연구

We have investigated the anisotropic dispersion force effects for surfaces alignment of liquid crystals (LCs) on rubbed polystyrene (PS) surfaces by unidirection. In microphotographs an of the textures, we obtained the nematic (N) LCs are shown to align in both direction parallel and perpendicular to the rubbing for region up to medium rubbing, however to align in the direction perpendicular to the rubbing for strong rubbing region. We suggest that the anisotropic dispersion force is very important rather than macro-surface groove effect to uniform alignment of LCs. We also measured the temperature dependence of extrapolation length of 5CB on rubbed PS surfaces for strong rubbing. It is shown that the polar anchoring strength of 5CB is very weak on rubbed PS surface compared to the rubbed polyimide (PI) surface.