Macroscopic Orientation Patterns in Smectic-CFilms

Abstract
An experimental study of electrostatically stabilized disclination walls is reported in the two-dimensional director field of freely suspended ferroelectric smectic-C films. This Letter presents measurements of the dependence of the wall width on applied field and the collapse rate of walls forming closed circular loops. These are the first measurements of macroscopic orientation patterns in a physical XY system.