Symmetry and multiple existence of critical points in 2D Landau-de Gennes Q-tensor theory

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• Luc Nguyen (University of Oxford)
• Thursday 17 January 2019, 11:45-12:30
• Seminar Room 1, Newton Institute.

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DNMW01 - Optimal design of complex materials

We study a Laudau-de Gennes model for liquid crystals where both the energy functional and the boundary data are invariant under the orthogonal group. In three dimensional settings, it is conjectured that minimizers break the rotational symmetry. We show however that in two dimensional settings, this no longer holds when the boundary data have no topological obstruction: the minimizers are `unique and rotationally symmetric'. As an application, we obtain existence of (multiple) non-minimizing rotationally symmetric critical points. Joint work with Radu Ignat, Valeriy Slastikov and Arghir Zarnescu.

This talk is part of the Isaac Newton Institute Seminar Series series.

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