Simulation of Gay-Berne Liquid Crystal Molecules Confined to a Plane.

The role of interaction energy in driving planar liquid crystalline systems towards the formation of nematic phases is analyzed for a series of Gay-Berne mesogen which differs in their inter-particle interaction strengths. In an attempt to gain a deeper insight into how the Gay-Berne potential controls the inter-particle interaction and in consequence the system properties, we choose its exponents [υ, μ] as our control parameter. Isochoric-Isothermal (NVT) Monte Carlo Simulation is performed in 2 dimensions on the above systems to study their structural correlations. The correlations present in the system is studied both as a function of temperature and inter-particle interaction strength. Our results depict that the nematic ordering bears a direct relation with the increase in interaction strength while varying inversely with an increase in temperature. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]