Electrostriction in quasicrystals and in the icosahedral liquid crystalline Blue Phases

Abstract

In the electrostriction process crystals are deforrned by an electric field in quadratic order. The components of the corresponding electrostriction tensor, which relates the square of the electric field components to the components of the strain tensor, have been measured recently for the cubic liquid crystalline Blue Phases. In quasiperiodic systems, like the icosahedral metallic alloys Almn or Alcufe, or in the icosahedral model for the Blue Phase III the electric field can also induce phason strain. Here we determine the corresponding generalized electrostriction tensor for icosahedral and decagonal phases and relate it to the generalized elastic And elasto- optic tensors. For certain values of the field, quasiperiodic systems can become periodic either along the field direction or perpendicular to it.