Liquid Crystal Institute    

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Peter Palffy-Muhoray

Professor, Chemical Physics

Associate Director, Liquid Crystal Institute

phone: 330-672-2604

FAX:  330-672-2796

 mpalffy@cpip.kent.edu

Research Interests:

Currently, I am interested in the following topics:

•  liquid crystal elastomers 
•  negative index materials
•  mirrorless lasing in liquid crystals
•  failure and breakdown

Group Members:

•  Jeremy Neal                   graduate student
•  Jake Fontana                  graduate student
•  Nithya Venkataraman     graduate student                          

•  Michele Moreira             post-doctoral fellow
•  Paul Luchette                  post-doctoral fellow
•  Reda Abouhussein          post-doctoral fellow
•  Piotr Lesiak                    visiting post-doctoral fellow

  Jeremy Neal                                  Jake Fontana                         Nithya Venkataraman

   Michele Moreira                            Paul Luchette                          Reda Abouhussein                        Piotr Lesiak

Collaborators:

•  Xiaoyu Zheng                 Department of Mathematical Sciences, KSU
•  Michael Shelley              Courant Institute of Mathematical Sciences, NYU
•  Bahman Taheri                AlphaMicron, Inc.

Visitors:

•  Piotr Lesiak                    post-doctoral fellow, from Warsaw University of Technology

Outreach:

•  Current outreach efforts include interactions with undergraduates
•  as well high school students.                 mentioned in Howstuffworks.

Group Photo:                                                               Aug. 27, 2007.

Rear:  Xiaoyu Zheng, Sarah Hicks, Jake Fontana, Jeremy Neal, P.P-M,

          Paul Luchette, Michele Moreira, Nithya Venkataraman

Front:  Liwei Li, Israel Martinez, Rafael Zola, Reda Abouhussein

Some Representative Publications:

•  Orientationally Ordered Soft Matter: The Diverse World of Liquid Crystals                    e-LC.org/docs/2007_08_26_01_36_22                              
•  Distance of closest approach of two arbitrary hard ellipses in two dimensions                  Phys. Rev. E, 75, 061709 (2007)
•  Director dynamics in liquid-crystal physical gels                                                              Soft Matter, 3, 993 (2007)
•  Photonics and lasing in liquid crystal materials                                                                 Phil. Trans. R. Soc. A  364, 2747 ((2006)
•  Nonlocal model for nematic liquid-crystal elastomers                                                      Phys. Rev. E, 74, 061802 (2006)
•  Fast liquid-crystal elastomer swims into the dark                                                            Nature Materials 3, 307 (2004)
•  A dunking bird of the second kind                                                                                 Am. J. Phys. 72, 782 (2004)
•  Lasing in a three-dimensional photonic crystal of the liquid crystal blue phase II               Nature Materials 1, 111 (2002)
•  Tunable Mirrorless Lasing in Cholesteric Liquid Crystalline Elastomers                           Adv. Mater. 13, 1069 (2001)

Science News:

•  Pulling Strings to Untangle Catastrophe                                                                          Science, 316, 47 (2007) 
•  Liquid Crystal Swims Like Fish to Escape from Laser Light                                           New Scientist,  2387,  March 22 (2003)
•  Rubbery Liquid Crystal Gives Lasers a Stretch                                                              Science, 292, 1468 (2001)

Teaching:

•  Fall 2007:  Liquid Crystal Materials (CPHY-72250)
•  Spring 2008: LC Optics and Photonics (CPHY-74495)
•  Remote Lecture

Useful Links:

•  Electronic Liquid Crystal Communications e-LC
  
•  International Liquid Crystal Society
•  AlphaMicron, Inc.