Fig. 2: Liquid crystals of BNNTs. | Nature Communications

Fig. 2: Liquid crystals of BNNTs.

From: Liquid crystals of neat boron nitride nanotubes and their assembly into ordered macroscopic materials

Fig. 2

Polarized light microscopy (PLM) of BNNTs in chlorosulfonic acid (CSA) in flame-sealed 1 mm × 0.1 mm rectangular capillaries (a–c): unpolarized transmitted light and polarized light images with polarizer/analyzer at 0°/90° and 45°/135°, as depicted by the white crossed arrows. a Solution of lightly purified BNNTs (LP-BNNTs) at 7000 ppmw showing an isotropic solution with few birefringent domains. b Solution of highly purified BNNTs (HP-BNNTs) at 7260 ppmw showing 20 μm regions of strong birefringence. White arrows in b highlight the same elliptical structure in all three images. Red arrows highlight the same isotropic region in both polarized images. c Solution of HP-BNNTs at 7260 ppmw (the same solution as b) after ~5 s of bath sonication of the filled capillary. d High magnification PLM images after dilution of the solution in b to 3000 ppmw showing three different tactoids between crossed-polarizer and analyzer at various angles. The scale bar is 10 μm for all tactoid images. e Cryogenic scanning electron micrograph of BNNTs in CSA at 8000 ppmw showing aligned and isotropic regions in a biphasic BNNT solution.

Back to article page