Anchoring effect on switching dynamics of a nematic liquid crystal intensity modulator

The director reorientation relaxation time of a novel nematic liquid crystal is measured through fitting the decay curve of intensity modulation by Ericksen–Leslie equation. Application of the so-called hard anchoring condition results in simplifying the mentioned equation as well as ignoring the reorientation of boundary molecules in switching procedure. This paper investigates the hardness of 1294-1b nematic liquid crystal's anchoring on rubbed PVA and the effect of boundary molecules on response time and viscoelastic coefficient calculation by experimentally obtaining the decay times of different sample thicknesses.