TY - JOUR A1 - Li, Z. A1 - Raab, A. A1 - Kolmangadi, Mohamed Aejaz A1 - Busch, M. A1 - Grunwald, M. A1 - Demel, F. A1 - Bertram, F. A1 - Kityk, A. V. A1 - Schönhals, Andreas A1 - Laschat, S. A1 - Huber, P. T1 - Self-Assembly of Ionic Superdiscs in Nanopores N2 - Discotic ionic liquid crystals (DILCs) consist of self-assembled superdiscs of cations and anions that spontaneously stack in linear columns with high one-dimensional ionic and electronic charge mobility, making them prominent model systems for functional soft matter. Compared to classical nonionic discotic liquid crystals, many liquid crystalline structures with a combination of electronic and ionic conductivity have been reported, which are of interest for separation membranes, artificial ion/proton conducting membranes, and optoelectronics. Unfortunately, a homogeneous alignment of the DILCs on the macroscale is often not achievable, which significantly limits the applicability of DILCs. Infiltration into nanoporous solid scaffolds can, in principle, overcome this drawback. However, due to the experimental challenges to scrutinize liquid crystalline order in extreme spatial confinement, little is known about the structures of DILCs in nanopores. Here, we present temperaturedependent high-resolution optical birefringence measurement and 3D reciprocal space mapping based on synchrotron X-ray scattering to investigate the thermotropic phase behavior of dopamine-based ionic liquid crystals confined in cylindrical channels of 180 nm diameter in macroscopic anodic aluminum oxide membranes. As a function of the membranes’ hydrophilicity and thus the molecular anchoring to the pore walls (edge-on or face-on) and the variation of the hydrophilic−hydrophobic balance between the aromatic cores and the alkyl side chain motifs of the superdiscs by tailored chemical synthesis, we find a particularly rich phase behavior, which is not present in the bulk state. It is governed by a complex interplay of liquid crystalline elastic energies (bending and splay deformations), polar interactions, and pure geometric confinement and includes textural transitions between radial and axial alignment of the columns with respect to the long nanochannel axis. Furthermore, confinement-induced continuous order formation is observed in contrast to discontinuous first-order phase transitions, which can be quantitatively described by Landau-de Gennes free energy models for liquid crystalline order transitions in confinement. Our observations suggest that the infiltration of DILCs into nanoporous solids allows tailoring their nanoscale texture and ion channel formation and thus their electrical and optical functionalities over an even wider range than in the bulk state in a homogeneous manner on the centimeter scale as controlled by the monolithic nanoporous scaffolds. KW - Ionic Liquid Crystals KW - Nanopropous materials KW - Landau de-Gennes analysis KW - X-ray scattering KW - Optical birefringence PY - 2024 UR - https://nbn-resolving.org/urn:nbn:de:kobv:b43-600797 DO - https://doi.org/10.1021/acsnano.4c01062 SN - 1936-0851 VL - 18 IS - 22 SP - 14414 EP - 14426 PB - ACS AN - OPUS4-60079 LA - eng AD - Bundesanstalt fuer Materialforschung und -pruefung (BAM), Berlin, Germany ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Kolmangadi, Mohamed Aejaz A1 - Smales, Glen Jacob A1 - ZhuoQing, Li A1 - Yildirim, Arda A1 - Wuckert, E. A1 - Eutionnat, S. A1 - Demel, F. A1 - Huber, P A1 - Lasachat, S. A1 - Schönhals, Andreas T1 - Side Chain Length-Dependent Dynamics and Conductivity in Self-Assembled Ion N2 - We study the molecular mobility and electrical conductivity of a homologous series of linear shaped columnar ionic liquid crystals ILCn, (n = 8, 10, 12, 14, 16) using broadband dielectric spectroscopy (BDS), specific heat spectroscopy (SHS), and X-ray scattering. We aim to understand how the alkyl chain length influences the dynamics and electric conductivity in this system. Two dielectrically active relaxation modes are observed, the γ and the αcore process, that correspond to the localized fluctuations of the alkyl chains and cooperative motions of the aromatic core in the columns, respectively. Both the γ relaxation and the αcore process slow down with increasing alkyl chain length. SHS reveals one relaxation process, the αalkyl process that has a similar temperature dependence as that of the αcore process for ILC12, 14, and 16 but shifts to higher temperature for ILC8 and 10. For ILC12, 14, and 16, the absolute values of DC conductivity increase by 4 orders of magnitude at the transition from the plastic crystalline to hexagonal columnar phase. For ILC8 and 10, the DC conductivity behavior is similar to ionic liquids, where the conductivity is coupled with structural relaxation. Small-angle X-ray investigations reveal that both the intercolumnar distance and the disorder coherence length increase with alkyl chain length; conversely, the DC conductivity decreases monotonically. KW - Ionic Liquid Crystals PY - 2022 DO - https://doi.org/10.1021/acs.jpcc.2c03023 SN - 1932-7447 VL - 126 IS - 27 SP - 10995 EP - 11006 PB - ACS AN - OPUS4-55194 LA - eng AD - Bundesanstalt fuer Materialforschung und -pruefung (BAM), Berlin, Germany ER -