Nanoparticles in binary mixture of liquid crystal and dodecanol

Many liquid crystals compounds exhibit the phase sequence Isotropic-Nematic-Smectic-A as the sample is cooled, while some others go over directly to the smectic-A phase from the isotropic liquid. Adding a long chain alcohol suppresses the nematic phase and leads to the formation of a smectic phase via novel kinetics. We study the kinetics of isotropic-Smetic-A phase transition in the binary mixture of liquid crystal with long chain alcohol (our system is Octyloxycyanobiphenyl + dodecanol), the growth of Smectic-A from isotropic phase occurs in the form of long cylindrical structures, which we have already observed under polarising microscope. Attempts have been made to disperse finite concentrations of nanoparticles in liquid crystals which has a great interest from a fundamental and practical standpoint. We have dispersed small amounts of CdSe semiconductor quantum dots into this binary mixture and studied the particle behaviour using fluorescence microscopy. We hope to create a range of novel soft composite materials over the time.