2A07 Effect of an external field on the director configuration of a liquid crystal around a spherical particle

Abstract

We study numerically the effect of an external (electric or magnetic) field on the director and defect configuration of a nematic liquid crystal around a spherical particle. An adaptive mesh refinement scheme that we devised previously proves to be useful in the investigation of the dynamics of topological defects. We reproduce successfully the transition of a hedgehog defect to a Saturn ring, which was observed in recent experiments.