Heat-driven rotations in cholesteric droplets dispersed in fluorinated oligomers

Abstract

Recently, it has been reported the texture on cholesteric droplets rotates under temperature gradient at the isotopic-cholesteric coexistence state in the mixed system with several liquid crystalline molecules. To examine the generality of this phenomenon, we made the system where the cholesteric droplets were dispersed in an isotropic solvent with fluorinated oligomers, and applied temperature gradient to the system. As a result, the rotation was induced in the droplets with the speed one or two order faster than that in the mixed system with the liquid crystalline molecules.