Surface-induced interaction of colloidal particles in isotropic liquid crystals

Abstract

In this work, we study the interaction of two colloidal particles in a liquid crystal that is in the isotropic phase. The interaction is caused by surface-induced polarization of the liquid crystal molecules in the vicinity of the particles. We found that the interaction is short-ranged in both 2D and 3D geometry. Under symmetric homeotropic anchoring conditions, the interaction is repulsive. While under anti-symmetric homeotropic anchoring conditions, the interaction is repulsive at short distances but attractive at intermediate distances. The particle size makes a strong impact on the effective interaction force.