Chiqun Zhang's blog

Chiqun Zhang            Amit Acharya            Saurabh Puri

A generalized disclination (g.disclination) theory [AF15] has been recently introduced that goes beyond treating standard translational and rotational Volterra defects in a continuously distributed defects approach; it is capable of treating the kinematics and dynamics of terminating lines of elastic strain and rotation discontinuities. In this work, a numerical method is developed to solve for the stress and distortion fields of g.disclination systems. Problems of small and finite deformation theory are considered. The fields of a single disclination, a single dislocation treated as a disclination dipole, a tilt grain boundary, a misfitting grain boundary with disconnections, a through twin boundary, a terminating twin boundary, a through grain boundary, a star disclination/penta-twin, a disclination loop (with twist and wedge segments), and a plate, a lenticular, and a needle inclusion are approximated. It is demonstrated that while the far-field topological identity of a dislocation of appropriate strength and a disclination-dipole plus a slip dislocation comprising a disconnection are the same, the latter microstructure is energetically favorable. This underscores the complementary importance of all of topology, geometry, and energetics in understanding defect mechanics. It is established that finite element approximations of fields of interfacial and bulk line defects can be achieved in a systematic and routine manner, thus contributing to the study of intricate defect microstructures in the scientific understanding and predictive design of materials. Our work also represents one systematic way of studying the interaction of (g.)disclinations and dislocations as topological defects, a subject of considerable subtlety and conceptual importance [Mer79, AMK17].

Chiqun Zhang            Amit Acharya            Noel J. Walkington            Oleg D. Lavrentovich

Motivated by recent experiments, the isotropic-nematic phase transition in chromonic liquid crystals is studied. As temperature decreases, nematic nuclei nucleate, grow, and coalesce, giving rise to tactoid microstructures in an isotropic liquid. These tactoids produce topological defects at domain junctions (disclinations in the bulk or point defects on the surface). We simulate such tactoid equilibria and their coarsening dynamics with a model using degree of order, a variable length director, and an interfacial normal as state descriptors. We adopt Ericksen's work and introduce an augmented Oseen-Frank energy, with non-convexity in both interfacial energy and the dependence of the energy on the degree of order. A gradient flow dynamics of this energy does not succeed in reproducing some simple expected feature of tactoid dynamics. Therefore, a strategy is devised based on continuum kinematics and thermodynamics to represent such features. The model is used to predict tactoid nucleation, expansion, and coalescence during the process of phase transition. We reproduce observed behaviors in experiments and perform an experimentally testable parametric study of the effect of bulk elastic and tactoid interfacial energy parameters on the interaction of interfacial and bulk fields in the tactoids.

Chiqun Zhang            Amit Acharya

The utility of the notion of generalized disclinations in materials science is discussed within the physical context of modeling interfacial and bulk line defects like defected grain and phase boundaries, dislocations and disclinations. The Burgers vector of a disclination dipole in linear elasticity is derived, clearly demonstrating the equivalence of its stress field to that of an edge dislocation. We also prove that the inverse deformation/displacement jump of a defect line is independent of the cut-surface when its g.disclination strength vanishes. An explicit formula for the displacement jump of a single localized composite defect line in terms of given g.disclination and dislocation strengths is deduced based on the Weingarten theorem for g.disclination theory at finite deformation. The Burgers vector of a g.disclination dipole at finite deformation is also derived.

Chiqun Zhang          Xiaohan Zhang         Amit Acharya          Dmitry Golovaty          Noel Walkington

Nonsingular disclination dynamics in a uniaxial nematic liquid crystal is modeled within a mathematical framework where the kinematics is a direct extension of the classical way of identifying these line defects with singularities of a unit vector field representing the nematic director. It is well known that the universally accepted Oseen-Frank energy is infinite for configurations that contain disclination line defects. We devise a natural augmentation of the Oseen-Frank energy to account for physical situations where, under certain conditions, infinite director gradients have zero associated energy cost, as would be necessary for modeling half-integer strength disclinations within the framework of the director theory. Equilibria and dynamics (in the absence of flow) of line defects are studied within the proposed model. Using appropriate initial/boundary data, the gradient-flow dynamics of this energy leads to non-singular, line defect equilibrium solutions, including those of half-integer strength. However, we demonstrate that the gradient flow dynamics for this energy is not able to adequately describe defect evolution. Motivated by similarity with dislocation dynamics in solids, a novel 2D-model of disclination dynamics in nematics is proposed. The model is based on the extended Oseen-Frank energy and takes into account thermodynamics and the kinematics of conservation of defect topological charge. We validate this model through computations of disclination equilibria, annihilation, repulsion, and splitting. We show that the energy function we devise, suitably interpreted, can serve as well for the modeling of equilibria and dynamics of dislocation line defects in solids making the conclusions of this paper relevant to mechanics of both solids and liquid crystals.