Absorbance Spectra of Co2+ Alkanoate Liquid Crystals and Smectic Glasses

The work is devoted to the study of the optical properties of ionic thermotropic liquid crystals of the homologous series of cobalt alkanoates and their smectic glasses using methods of electronic spectroscopy. The aim of the study was to determine the dominant coordination of cobalt cations in the alkanoate matrix and the nature of the matrix's influence on the absorption of samples. It is shown that the dominant coordination of cobalt ions in the studied media is the octahedron. A significant decrease in the absorption coefficient with the increase in the length of the aliphatic chain in the homologous series of cobalt alkanoates is due to a decrease in both the volume concentration of the cobalt cation complexes and the values of the dipole moments of the d-d transitions.