Defects in Liquid Crystals: Computer Simulations, Theory and Experiments

Topological defects are the subject of intensive studies in many different branches of physics ranging from cosmology to liquid crystals and from elementary particles to colloids and biological systems. Liquid crystals are fascinating materials which present a great variety of these mathematical objects and can therefore be considered as an extremely useful laboratory for topological defects.
This book is the first attempt to present together complementary approaches to the investigations of topological defects in liquid crystals using theory, experiments and computer simulations.

1 Classification of defects in liquid crystals.- 2 Alignment tensor versus director description in nematic liquid crystals.- 3 Liquid crystal colloidal dispersions.- 4 Computer simulations and defects in confined liquid crystal lattice models.- 5 Molecular simulations and theory of planar interfaces and defects in nematic liquid crystals.- 6 Topological defect behavior in a quenched nematic liquid crystal.- 7 Restoring forces on nematic disclinations.- 8 Challenges in the dynamics of point defects.- 9 Numerical simulation of elastic anisotropy in nematic liquid crystalline polymers.- 10 Computer Simulations and Fluorescence Confocal Polarizing Microscopy of Structures in Cholesteric Liquid Crystals.- 11 Defects and Undulation in Layered Liquid Crystals.- 12 Liquid crystals under shear: role of defects.- 13 Numerical simulation of defects in quasicrystals.