The Viscosity Coefficients of Oriented Nematic and Nematic Discotic Liquid Crystals; Affine Transformation Model

General expressions are derived for the anisotropy of the viscosity and for the Leslie coefficients governing the flow alignment subject to the assumption that the equipotential surfaces for the interaction of oriented nonspherical molecules in the nematic or nematic discotic phase of a liquid crystal are related to a spherical interaction potential by an affine transformation. In particular, for uniaxial particles, the seven independent viscosity coefficients of a nematic are given in terms of the two viscosity coefficients of a reference fluid of spherical particles and the axes ratio of the nonspherical molecules. The theory is compared with results from nonequilibrium molecular dynamics computer simulations and with experimental data

Friction Drag on a Particle Moving in a Nematic Liquid Crystal

The flow of a liquid crystal around a particle does not only depend on its shape and the viscosity coefficients but also on the direction of the molecules. We studied the resulting drag force on a sphere moving in a nematic liquid crystal (MBBA) in a low Reynold's number approach for a fixed director field (low Ericksen number regime) using the computational artificial compressibility method. Taking the necessary disclination loop around the sphere into account, the value of the drag force anisotropy (F_\perp/F_\parallel=1.50) for an exactly computed field is in good agreement with experiments (~1.5) done by conductivity diffusion measurements. We also present data for weak anchoring of the molecules on the particle surface and of trial fields, which show to be sufficiently good for most applications. Furthermore, the behaviour of the friction close to the transition point nematic isotropic and for a rod-like and a disc-like liquid crystal will be given.Comment: 23 pages RevTeX, including 3 PS figures, 1 PS table and 1 PS-LaTeX figure; Accepted for publication in Phys. Rev.