Effects of solute properties and concentrations on liquid crystals: N-(4-ethoxybenzylidene)-2,6-dideutero-4-n-butylaniline

The effects of the nature and concentration of the solutes 1,3,5-trichlorobenzene (TCB), benzene, chlorobenzene, o-dichlorobenzene, m-dichlorobenzene, and p-dichlorobenzene on orientational order in the nematic liquid crystal N-(4-ethoxybenzylidene)-2,6-dideutero-4-n-butylaniline are investigated using NMR spectroscopy. Seven separate samples containing differing concentrations of all solutes are investigated at constant temperature, at constant reduced temperature, at constant TCB orientational order, and at constant liquid crystal orientational order. Various schemes for comparison of orientational order among the samples are examined. For the experiments performed here, the most consistent method to compare solute orientational order in the different samples is to multiply results from the experiments performed at constant temperature by the factor needed to equate the TCB order parameters. (C) 2002 American Institute of Physics.