Eur. Phys. J. E (2015) 38: 65
https://doi.org/10.1140/epje/i2015-15065-8

Regular Article

Macroscopic behavior of ferrocholesteric liquid crystals and ferrocholesteric gels and elastomers

¹ Theoretische Physik III, Universität Bayreuth, 95440, Bayreuth, Germany
² Max-Planck-Institute for Polymer Research, POBox 3148, 55021, Mainz, Germany

^* e-mail: brand@uni-bayreuth.de
^** e-mail: pleiner@mpip-mainz.mpg.de

Received: 11 April 2015
Revised: 21 May 2015
Accepted: 27 May 2015
Published online: 29 June 2015

Abstract

We study the influence of macroscopic chirality on the macroscopic properties of superparamagnetic liquid crystals and gels. Specifically we derive macroscopic dynamic equations for ferrocholesteric low molecular weight (LMW) liquid crystals and for ferrocholesteric gels and elastomers in the local description using the director field as macroscopic variable. The magnetization is treated as a macroscopic dynamic degree of freedom and its coupling to all other macroscopic variables is examined in detail. We incorporate into our dynamic analysis terms that are linear in a magnetic field giving rise to a number of cross-coupling terms not possible otherwise. A number of properties that are unique to the class of systems studied arise. As an example for a static property we find a term in the generalized energy which is linear in the electric field and quadratic in the magnetic field. We find that applying a magnetic field to a ferrocholesteric can lead to reversible electric currents, heat currents and concentration currents, which change their sign with a sign change of macroscopic chirality. As an example of a rather intriguing dissipative dynamic contribution we point out that for ferrocholesterics and for ferrocholesteric gels and elastomers in a magnetic field extensional flow leads to electric and heat currents.