Nematic liquid crystals

Patent Granted One of the most common LC phases is the nematic. The word nematic comes from the Greek νήμα (Greek: nema), which means "thread". This term originates from the thread-like topological defects observed in nematics, which are formally called 'disclinations'. Nematics also exhibit so-called "hedgehog" topological defects. In a nematic phase, the calamitic or rod-shaped organic molecules have no positional order, but they self-align to have long-range directional order with their long axes roughly parallel.