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Frustrated order on extrinsic geometries
- Publication Year :
- 2011
-
Abstract
- We study, analytically and theoretically, defects in a nematically-ordered surface that couple to the extrinsic geometry of a surface. Though the intrinsic geometry tends to confine topological defects to regions of large Gaussian curvature, extrinsic couplings tend to orient the nematic in the local direction of maximum or minimum bending. This additional frustration is unavoidable and most important on surfaces of negative Gaussian curvature, where it leads to a complex ground state thermodynamics. We show, in contradistinction to the well-known effects of intrinsic geometry, that extrinsic curvature expels disclinations from the region of maximum curvature above a critical coupling threshold. On catenoids lacking an "inside-outside" symmetry, defects are expelled altogether.<br />Comment: 4 pages, 3 figures
- Subjects :
- Condensed Matter - Soft Condensed Matter
Condensed Matter - Statistical Mechanics
Subjects
Details
- Database :
- arXiv
- Publication Type :
- Report
- Accession number :
- edsarx.1108.1573
- Document Type :
- Working Paper
- Full Text :
- https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevLett.108.017801