Control over Vertical Orientation of Liquid Crystal using Spin Coated Silica Nanoparticles Layer on Conductive Substrates

Abstract

Recently, various techniques such as self-assembly, chemical vapour deposition and capillary method etc. are used for nanoparticles (NPs) deposition on the conductive substrates for the vertical alignment (VA) of liquid crystals (LCs). The initial VA of LCs in display devices have the potential impact on industry and various electro-optic devices applications. In the present work, vertical orientation of LCs was controlled on silica (SiO2) nanoparticles (NPs) layer deposited on indium tin oxide (ITO) glass substrates using spin coating method. The VA LC cell was also prepared for conventional polyimide coated ITO glass substrates. The morphological images showed the initial darker textures under crossed polarizers and conoscopic image with dark cross confirmed the VA of LC on SiO2 NPs coated substrates analogous to the conventional VA LC cell. Further, electro-optic results revealed the reduction in applied voltage and better contrast ratio for SiO2 NPs coated VA LC cell compared with polyimide coated VA LC cell.