title: Defect trajectories in nematic shells: role of elastic anisotropy and thickness heterogeneity.
abstract: We introduce the idea of transformation trajectories to describe the evolution of nematic shells in terms of defect locations and director field when the elastic anisotropy and the shell thickness heterogeneity vary. Experiments are compared to numerical results to clarify the exact role played by these two parameters. We demonstrate that heterogeneity in thickness is a result of a symmetry breaking initiated by buoyancy and enhanced by liquid crystal elasticity, and is irrespective of the elastic anisotropy. In contrast, elastic anisotropy--in particular, disfavored bend distortion--drives an asymmetric defect reorganization. These shell states can be both stable or metastable.
authors.affiliation: Department of Physics, University of Ljubljana, Jadranska 19, SLO-1000 Ljubljana, Slovenia.
authors.forename: David
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Seč
authors.forename: Teresa
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Lopez-Leon
authors.forename: Maurizio
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Nobili
authors.forename: Christophe
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Blanc
authors.forename: Alberto
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Fernandez-Nieves
authors.forename: Miha
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Ravnik
authors.forename: Slobodan
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Žumer