Configurations of liquid crystalline polymers in nematic solvents

We have considered the effect of a nematic solvent on the configurations of liquid crystalline polymers (LCPs) modeled as semiflexible chains. The model for the chain is a generalization of the Kratky-Porod model satisfying the global inextensibility of the chain for all values of coupling with the nematic field. We have calculated analytically the components of the mean-square end-to-end distance, persistence length and radius of gyration parallel and perpendicular to the nematic director, and the asymptotic behaviors of the structure factor. We also discuss the effect of architecture on the configurations of the polymer. We conclude that the configurations of main-chain and side-on side-chain LCPs are more sensitive to the nematic solvent than those of end-on side-chain LCPs. (C) 1998 American Institute of Physics. [S0021-9606(98)50648-4].