Liquid-Crystalline Ordering Helps Block Copolymer Self-Assembly

Interaction between liquid-crystalline elastic deformation and microphase separation in liquid-crystalline block copolymers enables them to supramolecularly assemble into ordered nanostructures with high regularity. With the help of liquid-crystalline alignment, parallel and perpendicular patterning of nanostructures is fabricated with excellent reproducibility and mass production, which provides nanotemplates and nanofabrication processes for preparing varieties of nanomaterials. Furthermore, nanoscale microphase separation improves the optical performance of block-copolymer films by eliminating the scattering of visible light, leading to advanced applications in optical devices and actuators. Recent progress in liquid-crystalline block copolymers, including their phase diagram, structure-property relationship, nanostructure control and nanotemplate applications, is reviewed.