Wen Chen, featured ILCS liquid crystal artist, November 2022

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Wen Chen is currently a postgraduate student in Nanjing University under the supervision of Assoc. Prof. Peng Chen. Her research work mainly involves the application of different liquid crystals in optical field control.

Research group webpage: https://light.nju.edu.cn
Contact e-mail: chenwen(at)smail.nju.edu.cn
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The texture was obtained by cooling the sample from smectic A phase to smectic C* phase at a heating stage. This ferroelectric liquid crystal cell was assembled by one substrate coated with a uniformly-aligned photoalignment layer and the other bare substrate. This beautiful microphotograph was taken under a crossed-polarizing optical microscope (5x objective) at 72℃, showing the wonderful process of the phase transition.
Jury comment: The microphotography shows defects that are characteristic in the LC field. Once again POM shows how liquid crystals combine science and artistic aspects, so the microphotography is highly colorful and attractive from an aesthetic and artistic point of view.