Measurement of Refractive Indices of Ferroelectric SmC* Liquid Crystal by the Fabry-Perot Interference Method

Abstract
The wavelength and temperature dependences of the principal refractive indices (n e and n o ) of a ferroelectric SmC* liquid crystal were measured by using the Fabry-Perot interference technique in the surface stabilized cell. The refractive indices have a normal wavelength dispersion similar to a nematic liquid crystal. The refractive indices for about 630 nm wavelength in the SmC* phase gradually increase as the temperature rises and then remain almost constant in the SmA phase. The layer tilt (i.e., molecular tilt from glass plate) due to the chevron structure in the SmC* phase was also taken into account for the evaluation of n e .