Ag. Vanakaras et al., TILT, POLARITY, AND SPONTANEOUS SYMMETRY-BREAKING IN LIQUID-CRYSTALS, Physical review. E, Statistical physics, plasmas, fluids, and related interdisciplinary topics, 57(5), 1998, pp. 4875-4878
We show through explicit molecular modeling how tilt may be induced in
layered mesophases and propagate across the-layers, using a concrete
representation of flexible tail-core-tail calamitic mesogens in conjun
ction with-the variational cluster expansion. The results demonstrate
that spontaneous symmetry breaking observed in smectic-liquid crystals
-the tilt of the director relative to the layers-can be induced by exc
luded. volume interactions, both in the synclinic and in the anticlini
c configurations.