• Flow like Liquids
• Partial Ordering:

Orientational	Translational
Nematic	Smectic A

• Chiral Nematics (Cholesteric Liquid Crystals)
  • Helical Phase
  • Blue Phases
• Smectics B, C, C*, I, I*, Rippled P-beta-prime
• Cubic ``Smectic'' D
• Biaxial Nematics
• Hexatics
• Discotics
• Twist-Grain Boundary Phases
• ...

• The Blue Phases: Introduction
• What Are Liquid Crystals?
• Order Parameter Fields
• Defects in Nematic Liquids
• Homotopy Theory and Defects
• Parallel Transport and Energy
• Twisted Parallelism: Chiral Nematics
• Chiral Nematic Phases: Helical and Blue
• Blue Phases: Networks of Defect Lines
• Defect Lines and Frustration: Curved Space

Links Back

Sethna's Research 90-94

Entertaining Science done at

LASSP.

James P. Sethna, sethna@lassp.cornell.edu

Statistical Mechanics: Entropy, Order Parameters, and Complexity, now available at Oxford University Press (USA, Europe).