Abstract
We have investigated the pretilt angle of liquid crystal (LC) molecules induced by photoaligned films of a series of polyimides. The polyimides were random copolymers synthesized from pyromellitic dianhydride and a mixture of 4,4′-diaminoazobenzene and 4-[4′-propylbi(cyclohexan)-4-yl]phenyl 3,5-diaminobenzoate (PBCP-DABA). PBCP-DABA is a diamine to introduce a side-chain structure into polyimide. We found that the pretilt angle of LC molecules can be controlled from 0° to 90° by varying the molar fraction (x) of PBCP-DABA from 0 to 0.5. Defect-free uniform LC alignment was observed for x≤0.125 and x≥0.3, but threadlike textures appeared for 0.15≤x≤0.25. Since the interaction between the polyimide backbone structure and the LC molecule may be blocked by relatively dense side-chains, the appearance of threadlike texture is tentatively attributed to weak azimuthal anchoring strength of the photoaligned polyimide films with x≥0.15.
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