Exploring biaxial nematic order in graphene oxide nanocomposites

The proposal aims at exploring liquid crystal (LC) ordering in a novel nanocomposite system obtained by mixing two LC solutions: the lyotropic nematic (N) phase formed by a rod-like aramid polymer and the colloidal N phase comprised of graphene oxide (GO) platelets. A recent work suggests that the formation of a hybrid (macromolecular + colloidal), possibly biaxial, N phase is crucial to get a stable casting solution and, upon drying, composite polymeric films with highly enhanced mechanical properties. Beyond its technological relevance, studying this system is also interesting from a fundamental perspective, as it could represents a rare example of the much sought-after biaxial N phase and, as such, an ideal system to test the predictions of theoretical models. This goal is made experimentally challenging by the hybrid nature of this system, with its constituents exhibiting LC order at very different length scales, nanometric for the polymer vs. micrometric for the GO platelets.