Tailoring Liquid-Crystalline Supramolecular Structures By Ionic Interactions

The binary ionic liquid crystal composed of tris(2-aminoethyl)amine (1) and 3,4-dioctyloxybenzoic acid (2) was investigated. The type of the mesophases with the highest thermal stability was found to be specific to the 1-2 molar ratios; 1:2 for the smectic A phase and 1:4 for the hexagonal columnar phase.