Liquid Crystals

Introduction

Homogeneous, isotropic liquids have an average structure that is invariant under arbitrary rotations and translations.It has no long range order, and has the highest possible symmetry with maximum possible entropy.The crystalline state has long range translational and rotational order, with the lowest possible symmetry consistent with a regular filling of space. Between these two, there are systems which exhibit short range correlations in some directions and long range in others, and have symmetries intermediate between between those of liquids and crystals.

Among the materials that show intermediate order, the most widely studied are liquid crystals