Entropy stabilized form chirality in curved rod nematics: structure and symmetries

Despite almost a century of anticipation, polar uniaxial nematics were only recently discovered and shown to adopt a chiral supramolecular structure. Monte Carlo molecular simulations of curve-shaped rods show the propensity of such shapes to polymorphism revealing both smectic and nematic phases. The nematic exhibits a nanoscale modulated local structure characterized by a unique, polar, C₂-symmetry axis that tightly spirals generating a mirror-symmetry-breaking orgnization of the achiral rods-form chirality. A comprehensive characterization of the polarity and its symmetries in the nematic phase confirms that the nanoscale modulation violates splay- and twist-bend continuum elasticity. Instead it is shown that, analogous to the isotropic-to-nematic transition, entropy stabilizes the roto-translating polar director in the polar-twisted nematic phase. The conflation of macroscale form chirality in ferroelectric nematics with that in the twist-bend nematic stems from the misattribution of the nanoscale modulation in the lower temperature nematic ''NX phase'' found in CB7CB dimers.