scholarly journals Vertical Liquid Crystal Alignment of Comb-Like Alkyl Hydroxybenzoate-Substituted Polystyrene

Crystals ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 9 (6) ◽  
pp. 281 ◽  
Author(s):  
Changha Ju ◽  
Shinwoo Kang ◽  
Taehyung Kim ◽  
Chanhyuk Park ◽  
Hyo Kang

We investigated the liquid crystal (LC) alignment behaviors of butyl hydroxybenzoate-substituted polystyrene (PBHB#; # = 20, 40, 60, 80, and 100, where # indicates the molar fraction of butyl hydroxybenzoate in the side chain), methyl hydroxybenzoate-substituted polystyrene (PMHB100), and ethyl hydroxybenzoate-substituted polystyrene (PEHB100). Generally, LC cells made employing polymer films having longer alkyl groups in the side chain show vertical LC alignment. For instance, a LC cell fabricated with the PMHB100 film showed random planar LC alignment, while the LC cells made from the PEHB100 and PBHB100 films exhibited vertical LC alignment. Moreover, LC cells prepared from a polymer film having a higher molar content of butyl hydroxybenzoate in the side chain exhibited vertical LC alignment. The observed vertical LC alignment behaviors are closely related to the surface energy of these polymer films. For instance, vertical LC alignment was observed when the surface energy of the polymer film was less than ~43.86 mJ/m2, which could result from the nonpolar alkyl groups of the alkyl hydroxybenzoate moiety. The LC cell prepared from PBHB100 as the LC alignment layer showed good electro-optical characteristics such as voltage holding ratio, residual DC voltage, and alignment stability at 200 °C.


Polymers ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (5) ◽  
pp. 736
Author(s):  
Kyutae Seo ◽  
Hyo Kang

We synthesized a series of polystyrene derivatives that were modified with precursors of liquid crystal (LC) molecules, such as 4-ethyloxyphenol (homopolymer PEOP and copolymer PEOP#; # = 20, 40, 60, and 80, where # indicates the molar fraction of 4-ethyloxyphenoxymethyl in the side chain), 4-n-butyloxyphenol (PBOP), 4-n-hexyloxyphenol (PHOP), and 4-n-octyloxyphenol (POOP), via polymer modification reaction to investigate the orientation of LC molecules on polymer films, exhibiting part of the LC molecular structure. LC molecules showed a stable and uniform vertical orientation in LC cells fabricated with polymers that have 4-ethyloxyphenoxymethyl in the range of 40–100 mol%. In addition, similar results were obtained in LC cells fabricated with homopolymers of PEOP, PBOP, PHOP, and POOP. The vertical orientation of LC molecules in LC cells fabricated with polymer films correlated to the surface energy of polymer films. For example, vertical LC orientation was observed when the total surface energies of the polymer films were lower than approximately 43.2 mJ/m2. Good alignment stabilities were observed at 150 °C and 20 J/cm2 of ultraviolet irradiation for LC cells fabricated with PEOP film.



Polymers ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (4) ◽  
pp. 547
Author(s):  
DaEun Yang ◽  
Kyutae Seo ◽  
Hyo Kang

We synthesized a series of renewable and plant-based isoeugenol-substituted polystyrenes (PIEU#, # = 100, 80, 60, 40, and 20, where # is the molar percent content of isoeugenol moiety), using polymer modification reactions to study their liquid crystal (LC) alignment behavior. In general, the LC cells fabricated using polymer film with a higher molar content of isoeugenol side groups showed vertical LC alignment behavior. This alignment behavior was well related to the surface energy value of the polymer layer. For example, vertical alignments were observed when the polar surface energy value of the polymer was smaller than approximately 3.59 mJ/m2, generated by the nonpolar isoeugenol moiety with long and bulky carbon groups. Good alignment stability at 100 °C and under ultraviolet (UV) irradiation of 15 J/cm2 was observed for the LC cells fabricated using PIEU100 as a LC alignment layer. Therefore, renewable isoeugenol-based materials can be used to produce an eco-friendly vertical LC alignment system.



Polymers ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (13) ◽  
pp. 2058
Author(s):  
Kyutae Seo ◽  
Hyo Kang

We synthesized a series of polystyrene derivatives modified with precursors of liquid crystal (LC) molecules via polymer modification reactions. Thereafter, the orientation of the LC molecules on the polymer films, which possess part of the corresponding LC molecular structure, was investigated systematically. The precursors and the corresponding derivatives used in this study include ethyl-p-hydroxybenzoate (homopolymer P2BO and copolymer P2BO#, where # indicates the molar fraction of ethylbenzoate-p-oxymethyl in the side chain (# = 20, 40, 60, and 80)), n-butyl-p-hydroxybenzoate (P4BO), n-hexyl-p-hydroxybenzoate (P6BO), and n-octyl-p-hydroxybenzoate (P8BO). A stable and uniform vertical orientation of LC molecules was observed in LC cells fabricated with P2BO#, with 40 mol% or more ethylbenzoate-p-oxymethyl side groups. In addition, the LC molecules were oriented vertically in LC cells fabricated with homopolymers of P2BO, P4BO, P6BO, and P8BO. The water contact angle on the polymer films can be associated with the vertical orientation of the LC molecules in the LC cells fabricated with the polymer films. For example, vertical LC orientation was observed when the water contact angle of the polymer films was greater than ~86°. Good orientation stability was observed at 150 °C and with 20 J/cm2 of UV irradiation for LC cells fabricated with the P2BO film.



RSC Advances ◽  
2017 ◽  
Vol 7 (66) ◽  
pp. 41376-41383 ◽  
Author(s):  
Changha Ju ◽  
Taehyung Kim ◽  
Hyo Kang

The liquid crystal (LC) alignment behavior on plant-based capsaicin substituted polystyrene film was investigated. This can give the basic idea for the design of eco-friendly LC alignment layer based on renewable resource containing polymer film.



Polymers ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (16) ◽  
pp. 2822
Author(s):  
DaEun Yang ◽  
Kyutae Seo ◽  
Hyo Kang

We synthesized a series of polystyrene derivatives containing various side groups, such as the 4-(tert-butyl)-phenoxymethyl, 3-(tert-butyl)-phenoxymethyl, 2-(tert-butyl)-phenoxymethyl, 4-cumyl-phenoxymethyl, and 4-trityl-phenoxymethyl groups, through a polymer modification reaction to examine the liquid crystal (LC) alignment of these derivatives. In general, the vertical LC alignment on polymer films can be affected by the position and structure of the terminal moiety of the polymer side group. For example, the LC cells fabricated with 4-(tert-butyl)-phenoxymethyl-substituted polystyrene having a tert-butyl moiety as a para-type attachment to the phenoxy groups of the polystyrene derivatives exhibited vertical LC alignment, whereas the LC cells prepared from 3-(tert-butyl)- and 2-(tert-butyl)-phenoxymethyl-substituted polystyrene films exhibited planar LC alignment. In addition, the LC cells fabricated from 4-cumyl- and 4-trityl-phenoxymethyl-substituted polystyrene films with additional phenyl rings in the side groups exhibited planar LC alignment, in contrast to the LC alignment of the (tert-butyl)-phenoxymethyl-substituted polystyrene series. The vertical LC orientation was well correlated with the surface energy of these polymer films. For example, vertical LC orientation, which mainly originates due to the nonpolar tertiary carbon moiety having bulky groups, was observed when the surface energy of the polymer was lower than 36.6 mJ/m2.



Polymers ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (9) ◽  
pp. 1404
Author(s):  
Kyutae Seo ◽  
Hyo Kang

We synthesized a series of polystyrene derivatives modified with precursors of liquid crystal (LC) molecules, including 4-(trans-4-ethylcyclohexyl)phenol (homopolymer PECH and copolymer PECH#; # = 5, 10, 15, 20, 40, 60, and 80, where # indicates the molar fraction of 4-(trans-4-ethylcyclohexyl)phenoxymethyl in the side chain), 4-(trans-4-propylcyclohexyl)phenol (PPCH), 4-(trans-4-butylcyclohexyl)phenol (PBCH), and 4-(trans-4-amylcyclohexyl)phenol (PAmCH) via polymer modification reactions in order to investigate the orientation of LC molecules on polymer films exhibiting part of the LC molecular structure. A stable and uniform vertical orientation of LC molecules was observed in LC cells fabricated with PECH#, having 15 mol% or more of 4-(trans-4-ethylcyclohexyl)phenoxymethyl side groups. In addition, the vertical orientation of LC molecules was observed in LC cells fabricated with homopolymers of PECH, PPCH, PBCH, and PAmCH. The water contact angle on the polymer films could be associated with the vertical orientation of the LC molecules in the LC cells fabricated with polymer films. For example, a vertical LC orientation was observed when the water contact angle of the polymer films was higher than ~81°. Good orientation stability was observed at 200 °C and 15 mW/cm2 of UV irradiation for LC cells fabricated with PECH films.



Crystals ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (3) ◽  
pp. 268
Author(s):  
Jeong-Hoon Ko ◽  
Jun-Chan Choi ◽  
Dong-Jin Lee ◽  
Jae-Won Lee ◽  
Hak-Rin Kim

In liquid crystal (LC) displays, deriving an optimum resistance level of an LC alignment polyimide (PI) layer is important because of the trade-off between the voltage holding and surface-discharging properties. In particular, to apply a power-saving low-frequency operation scheme to fringe-field switching (FFS) LC modes with negative dielectric LC (n-LC), delicate material engineering is required to avoid surface-charge-dependent image flickering and sticking problems, which severely degrade with lowering operation frequency. Therefore, this paper proposes a photocontrolled variable-resistivity PI layer in order to systematically investigate the voltage holding and discharging properties of the FFS n-LC modes, according to the PI resistivity (ρ) levels. By doping fullerene into the high-ρ PI as the photoexcited charge-generating nanoparticles, the ρ levels of the PI were continuously controllable with a wide tunable range (0.95 × 1015 Ω∙cm to 5.36 × 1013 Ω∙cm) through Ar laser irradiation under the same LC and LC alignment conditions. The frequency-dependent voltage holding and discharge behaviors were analyzed with photocontrolled ρ variation. Thus, the proposed experimental scheme is a feasible approach in PI engineering for a power-saving low-frequency FFS n-LC mode without the image flickering and image sticking issues.





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