Highly tunable liquid crystalline assemblies of superparamagnetic rod-like attapulgite@Fe3O4 nanocomposite

The uniform dispersed rod-shape superparamagnetic nanocomposite was prepared by the attachment of Fe3O4 particles onto attapulgite. These nanocomposites assemble into magnetically responsive liquid crystal with yellow Bragg reflections under an external magnetic field. The optical properties of the obtained liquid crystal can be controlled by the strength and the direction of the magnetic field as well as the concentration of attapulgite@Fe3O4. It was found that a maximum transmittance of light could be available with attapulgite@Fe3O4 concentration tuning from 1 mg/mL to 2 mg/mL when the magnet was fixed at a distance of 2 cm from the sample. We demonstrate the use of these nanocomposites to fabricate display and photonic devices. (C) 2018 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.