Universal fine structure of nematic hedgehogs

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Published under licence by IOP Publishing Ltd
, , Citation Samo Kralj and Epifanio G Virga 2001 J. Phys. A: Math. Gen. 34 829 DOI 10.1088/0305-4470/34/4/309

0305-4470/34/4/829

Abstract

We study in a Landau-de Gennes approach the biaxial structure of a nematic point defect with topological charge M = + 1. We aim to illuminate the role of the confining boundaries in determining the fine structure of the defect. We show that there are different regimes associated with different values of the ratio between the typical size R of the region in space occupied by the material and the biaxial correlation length ξb. For Rb>20 the core structure is already qualitatively universal, that is, independent of the confining geometry, while also for Rb>200 any quantitative difference is unlikely to be detected.

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