study of liquid crystals dispersed in micro-tructured elastic host materials

Liquid crystals (LC) have extensively been studied in display technology. Nevertheless, many of their properties are not fully udnerstood. We want to advance knowledge of the interaction between LC and deformable materials, including alignment, stability, refractive index matchin, etc. This is relevant for the upcoming flexible displays, but also for applications such as distributed sensors, artificial skin and tunable lenses.