Photo-Induced Alignment of Liquid Crystal Molecules on Alternate Self-Assembly Polymer Films Containing Azobenzene Evaluated by Attenuated Total Reflection Measurement

Abstract

Photo-induced in-plane alignments of the nematic liquid crystal (LC) molecule, 5CB, have been investigated in the cell with alternate layer-by-layer films of polyelectrolyte and low-molecular weight dyes on the gold electrodes using the attenuated total reflection (ATR) measurement method. Direct red 80 (DR80), azo dye, was employed as an anion; poly(diallyldimethylammonium chloride) (PDADMAC) was used as a polycation. The surface plasmon polaritoh (SPP) was observed in the ATR curves of the LC cells. The properties were sensitively changed by re-orientations of the LC molecules by means of the irradiation of the linearly polarized visible light to the LC cell. In-plane alignments of the LC molecules adjacent to the aligning layer were evaluated by fitting the theoretical ATR curves to the experimental ones.