Kaleidoscope
Liquid crystal
A dazzling array of unusual patterns can be found in a thin, liquid crystalline film seen through a polarizing microscope. A crystalline substance is marked by an orderly arrangement of molecules overall, but distortions can arise from point to point, resulting in the striking visual forms such as those seen here. In the liquid crystal shown above, called a nematic fluid, there are rod-like, elongated molecules that are free to move around, but tend to be parallel to each other. Their average orientation, however, changes from place to place in the film, which is only a thousandth of a millimeter thick.
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