Morphological and Dielectric Behavior of Carbon Nanotube-Ferroelectric Liquid Crystal Composite

Abstract

The present study deals with the effect of dispersing Carbon Nano Tubes in Ferro-electric liquid crystal material. Carbon nanotube dispersed ferroelectric liquid crystals have high dielectric constant, fast switching response, large electro-optic coefficient which makes them ideal for memories, capacitors and display devices etc. An attempt has been made to understand the influence of carbon nanotubes on dielectric and morphological properties of ferro-electric liquid crystal. The effect of carbon nanotubes concentration on the transition temperature of ferro-electric liquid crystal is also studied. Hot Stage Microscope is used to investigate the texture and phase transformations in the composite. Differential Scanning Calorimetry also indicated the phase transformations. The results are compared with the original ferro-electric liquid crystal material which showed that the dielectric permittivity is increased to a great extent with the addition of carbon nanotubes.