Room-Temperature Zwitterionic Liquid Crystals for Mechanical Actuators

We have developed room-temperature smectic liquid-crystalline (LC) ion conductors by the self-assembly of a zwitterionic mesogenic compound and a series of fluorinated lithium salts. The conductivity of lithium bis(trifluoromethylsulfonyl)imide LC complex reached 4 x 10(-3) S cm(-1) at ambient conditions. This LC complex sandwiched between two conductive polymer electrodes can be used in low-voltage mechanical actuators with a peak-to-peak bending deflection of ca. 20 mm upon +/- 1 V, 0.03 Hz excitation.