Helical twist and spontaneous polarization direction in ferroelectric smectic liquid crystals (Part II).

Previous studies have shown that there are simple relationships between the helical twist sense, spontaneous polarization direction, and orientational ordering in ferroelectric liquid crystals. These macroscopic properties are related to the microscopic properties of molecular structure, steric shape, and spatial configuration. This present study develops the original concepts further to include changes to the tilt orientation and conformational structure of the molecules. This allows the prediction of the spontaneous polarization direction for a given molecular species. The twist sense, however, is found to be rather insensitive to these changes and still adheres to the guidelines given previously.