Combinatorial Approach for the Rapid Determination of Thermochromic Behavior of Binary and Ternary Cholesteric Liquid Crystalline Mixtures

A combinatorial approach was developed for the rapid determination of thermochromic behavior of a large number of binary and ternary sterol based thermochromic liquid crystalline formulations. A binary mixture containing cholesteryl oleyl carbonate and cholesteryl nonanoate, and ternary mixtures also containing a third component, either cholesteryl oleate, cholesteryl benzoate, cholesteryl 2,4-dichlorobenzoate or cholesteryl propionate, were formulated via solvent deposition into a black Teflon coated aluminum 96 well plate. The temperature of the well plate was then varied, and the color appearance of the deposited mixture in each well was recorded. This approach allowed expedient examination of the thermochromic behavior for a large range of liquid crystal formulations. The accuracy of the rapid combinatorial technique was validated on selected thermochromic liquid crystal mixture compositions by comparing well thermochromic output with that observed using U-vis spectroscopy on material produced in gram quantities.