title: Smectic-A to -C phase transition in isotropic disordered environments.
abstract: We study theoretically the smectic-A to -C phase transition in isotropic disordered environments. Surprisingly, we find that, as in the clean smectic-A to -C phase transition, smectic layer fluctuations do not affect the nature of the transition, in spite of the fact that they are much stronger in the presence of the disorder. As a result, we find that the universality class of the transition is that of the "random field XY model" (RFXY).
authors.affiliation: College of Science, The China University of Mining and Technology, Xuzhou Jiangsu, 221116, People's Republic of China.
authors.forename: Leiming
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Chen
authors.forename: John
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Toner