Aggregative effect of mesogens in novel liquid-crystalline oligomers

Abstract

We have designed a novel tetra-mesogenic liquid crystal, N, N'-di{3,5-bis[6-(4-(5-octylpyrimidin-2-yl)phenoxy)hexyloxy]benzoyl}-1,6-diaminohexane, and investigated the phase transition behaviour by means of polarized optical microscopy and differential scanning calorimetry. The transition behaviour of the tetramer was found to depend on the thermal history, i.e., the tetramer exhibited different phase transition behaviour by cooling from different temperatures above the melting point. We discuss aggregative effect of mesogens in the liquid-crystalline oligomer on the kinetically-driven phase transition.