AFM investigations of a glassy cholesteric liquid crystal with hydrophobicaerosil particles

AFM investigations of a glassy heterogeneous system consisting of an oligom eric cholesteric liquid crystal and the hydrophobic aerosil R812 were carri ed out. With increasing aerosil concentration, a suppression of the charact eristic cholesteric surface pattern was observed. Typical separated aerosil aggregates appear in the samples. Their size and form change from small lu mps through bigger rod-like entities to large crystallite-like aggregates o f aerosil particles. This matches with observations of light scattering of systems with low molecular mass liquid crystals and of the memory effect. T he pitch of the cholesteric fingerprint pattern slightly decreases with inc rease in the aerosil concentration.