Self-organizing chiral liquid crystal (LC) architectures with phototunable properties have proved extremely fascinating for the design and fabrication of functional devices. As an example, photoresponsive cholesteric LCs can be made by doping photoresponsive chiral molecules into an achiral nematic LC host. The ability of a chiral dopant to induce a twist in the director orientation of an achiral nematic LC is quantified as the helical twisting power (HTP) and expressed in the equation HTP = (pc)-1, where p is the pitch length of helical superstructure and c is the chiral dopant concentration. Various kinds of photoresponsive molecules have been reported as chiral dopants for LC, such as azobenzenes, spirooxazines, fulgides, overcrowded alkenes and diarylethenes. Compared with the intensively studied cholesteric LCs consisting of chiral azobenzenes, chiral diarylethenes are of a particular interest due to the advantages of thermal stability and excellent fatigue resistance. These are indispensable for applications in functional device, such as memories and switches. In this talk, we will present our recent exciting progress on light-driven dithienylcyclopentene switches with axial chirality.1Supported by the Air Force Office of Scientific Research (FA9550-09-1-0193)

Synthesis and characterization of light-driven dithienylcyclopentene switches with axial chirality<sup>
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244th National Meeting (2012)

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