Electro-optical response of polymer-dispersed liquid crystal single layers of large nematic droplets oriented by rubbed teflon nanolayers

The surface orienting effect of rubbed teflon nanolayers on the morphology and electro-optical (EO) response of polymer-dispersed liquid crystal (PDLC) single layers of large nematic droplets was studied experimentally. In PDLC composites of the nematic liquid crystal (LC) E7 and NOA65 polymer, single droplets of LC with diameters as larger as 10 mu m were confined in layers with a thickness of 10 mu m, and the nematic director field was efficiently modified by nanostructuring teflon rubbing of the glass plates of the PDLC cell. For layered PDLCs arranged and oriented in this way, the modulated EO response by the dielectric oscillations of the nematic director exhibits a selective amplitude-frequency modulation controllable by both temperature and voltage applied, and is simply related to the LC droplet size. That may be of practical interest for PDLC-based modulators operating in the infrasound frequency range. (C) 2013 American Institute of Physics. [http://dx.doi.org/10.1063/1.4789897]