Ordered polymer microstructures obtained using pattern forming states of a cholesteric liquid crystal as templates

The formation of novel morphologically and optically anisotropic polymer microstructures was demonstrated using various patterns forming states of a cholesteric liquid crystals as templates. The cholesteric pattern forming states with 2-dimensional optical textures were used to achieve the templating effect. The results revealed that the network rich regions were determined by a phase seperation of the monomer in the region with weak or strong gradients in the deformatin of the liquid crystal orientations, prior to photopolymerization.