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On-off Intermittency in Stochastically Driven Electrohydrodynamic Convection in Nematics

Thomas John, Ralf Stannarius, Ulrich Behn

patt-solarXiv:patt-sol/9902004

Abstract

We report on-off intermittency in electroconvection of nematic liquid crystals driven by a dichotomous stochastic electric voltage. With increasing voltage amplitude we observe laminar phases of undistorted director state interrupted by shorter bursts of spatially regular stripes. Near a critical value of the amplitude the distribution of the duration of laminar phases is governed over several decades by a power law with exponent -3/2. The experimental findings agree with simulations of the linearized electrohydrodynamic equations near the sample stability threshold.

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