Abstract
The surface stabilized smectic A phase of homeotropic alignment (SmAII) appears even under the homogeneous anchoring due to an effect of walls as the symmetry breaking field to the smectic layer. As an analogue of the Freedericksz transition at nematic phase, a response of the transverse electric field at SmAII is studied by the constant temperature molecular dynamics simulation of the Gay-Berne system sandwiched by the walls, where each molecule has an electric dipole along the molecular long axis. At a threshold of the field strength, the system changes to the smectic A phase with layer normal being parallel to the electric field (SmAI) via an intermediate phase like a smectic C phase. By reducing the field, again SmAII appears directly, showing a hysteresis characteristic to the discontinuous transition. The dipole-dipole interaction is proved to stabilize the layer structure of smectics, while SmAI changes to smectic C phase in the electric field.
