2024/03/19 by Joseph Pollard, Pollard, Joseph, Gareth P. Alexander +1
Engineering · Materials Science · #Characterization and Applications of Magnetic Nanoparticles #FOS: Physical sciences #Liquid Crystal Research Advancements #Soft Condensed Matter (cond-mat.soft)
paper · pdf · doi:10.48550/arxiv.2403.13152
openalex publication_date 2024/03/19 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/28
Integer winding disclinations are unstable in a nematic and are removed by an `escape into the third dimension', resulting in a non-singular texture. This process is frustrated in a cholesteric material due to the requirement of maintaining a uniform handedness and instead results in the formation of strings of point defects, as well as complex three-dimensional solitons such as heliknotons that consist of linked dislocations. We give a complete description of this frustration using methods of contact topology. Furthermore, we describe how this frustration can be exploited to stabilise regions of the material where the handedness differs from the preferred handedness. These `twist solitons' are stable in numerical simulation and are a new form of topological defect in cholesteric materials that have not previously been studied.