Study of the physical properties of a mesogenic mixture showing induced smectic A(d) phase by refractive index, density and x-ray diffraction measurements.

The binary mixture of 4-n-pentyl phenyl 4-n'-hexyloxy benzoate (ME6O.5) and p-cyanophenyl trans-4-pentyl cyclohexane carboxylate (CPPCC) shows the presence of an induced smectic A(d) phase in a certain concentration range 0.03<x(CPPCC)<0.6. The results of the differential scanning calorimetry (DSC), refractive indices, densities and x-ray diffraction measurements are reported here. In general, the change in birefringence is continuous at the smectic A(d) to nematic phase transition for mixtures with x>0.33, whereas there is a discontinuity in these values for mixtures with x<0.33, consistent with the density and transition entropy measurements done on this system. The orientational order parameter, measured from x-ray diffraction studies, are somewhat smaller than those obtained from refractive index measurement in the induced smectic phase for all the mixtures. In the smectic phase, the OOP values initially increases with molar concentration up to x = 0.24 and then decreases showing a broad minima around x = 0.4. The variation of layer thickness in the induced smectic phase with composition has been explained by assuming the formation of homo- and heterodimers. We conclude that the possible packing of molecules in the induced smectic A(d) phase stabilizes the layers but increases the orientational free volume, consistent with the lower orientational order parameter.