Professor Glenn Evans is supported by a grant from the Theoretical and Computational Chemistry Program to study structure and dynamics of simple model systems for liquid crystalline fluids. For simplicity, the liquid crystalline forming molecules are envisioned as hard nonspherical bodies encircled with a spherical (square well) potential. The proposed analysis of equilibrium phenomena are concerned with the derivation of phase diagrams for nematic and smectic phases, fluid mixtures and chiral nematics. Elements of density functional theory, Onsager theory and scaled particle theory are combined to analyze the origin of these phases at high liquid densities. The dynamical properties to be addressed include: the self diffusion coefficient, the dielectric permittivity and the NMR spectral density for a single component nematic fluid. %%% Liquid crystals were discovered roughly one hundred years ago. They are materials with flow properties of a liquid and the optical properties of a solid. Since that time, these optical and fluid properties of LCs have been harnessed into display technology. The molecular physics underpinning the development of LCs is nontrivial. Liquid crystal displays are typically made from mixtures of chiral nematic phases with unusual optical and viscoelastic properties. The richness of the technological applications of these phases is in turn directly linked to the diversity of their thermodynamic and transport properties which are the subject of Professor Evans studies.
