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Liquid crystal defect
A liquid crystal defect is a localized region in a liquid crystal where molecular orientational order is singular or sharply distorted, including point defects and line disclinations.
Liquid crystal elastomer
A liquid crystal elastomer (LCE) is a lightly crosslinked polymer network combining rubber elasticity with liquid crystal order, deforming reversibly under heat, light, or electric fields.
Liquid crystal skyrmions
Skyrmions in liquid crystals are micrometer-scale, twist-like distortions of the director field carrying topological charge, imaged directly by optical microscopy and created with light, electric fields, or heat.
Liquid crystal thermography
Liquid crystal thermography is an optical temperature-measurement technique in which thermochromic liquid crystals coated on a surface change color with temperature, yielding full-field temperature maps.
Liquid helium
Liquid helium is the liquid state of the element helium, which exists only at cryogenic temperatures; first liquefied in 1908, helium-4 becomes a superfluid below about 2.17 K.
Liquid junction potential
The liquid junction potential, or diffusion potential, is the electric potential difference at the boundary between two electrolyte solutions of different composition, caused by ions diffusing at different speeds.
Liquid metal
A liquid metal is a metal or alloy that is molten, either at room temperature like mercury and gallium or when heated, used as reactor coolants and battery electrodes.
Liquid metal plasma-facing components
Liquid metal plasma-facing components are divertor and first-wall surfaces in magnetic confinement fusion devices faced with molten metals, most often lithium, tin, or gallium, which self-renew and resist neutron damage.
Liquid metal–organic frameworks
A liquid metal–organic framework (MOF liquid) is a metal–organic framework melted while keeping coordination bonds and porosity, first well characterized from a zeolitic imidazolate framework in 2017.
Liquid nitrogen
Liquid nitrogen (LN₂) is nitrogen gas liquefied into a colorless, nonflammable cryogenic liquid that boils at −195.8 °C and expands about 700-fold on evaporation, used for cryopreservation, cooling MRI magnets, and freezing foods.
Liquid phase deposition
Liquid phase deposition (LPD) is a solution-based thin-film method in which oxide films form on a substrate by controlled precipitation from an aqueous solution below 100 °C.
Liquid scintillation counting
Liquid scintillation counting (LSC) is a radiometric technique in which a radioactive sample dissolved in a scintillation cocktail is counted, standard for tritium and carbon-14.
Liquid water path
Liquid water path is a measure of the weight of liquid cloud droplets in the atmosphere above a unit surface area, routinely retrieved from microwave radiometers.
Liquid-assisted grinding
Liquid-assisted grinding, also called solvent-drop grinding, is a mechanochemical method in which a small amount of liquid added during grinding accelerates reactions and controls which product forms.
Liquid-cell electron microscopy
Liquid-cell electron microscopy, also called liquid-phase electron microscopy, seals liquid specimens between thin electron-transparent windows inside an electron microscope's vacuum, allowing real-time nanoscale imaging of processes in liquids.
Liquid-crystal polymer
A liquid-crystal polymer is a polymer whose rigid rod-like chains organize into an ordered liquid-crystalline state in solution or melt, first commercialized in the 1980s.
Liquid-like thermoelectric Cu2Se
Liquid-like thermoelectric Cu2Se is copper(I) selenide, a superionic semiconductor whose copper ions move liquid-like through a rigid selenium sublattice, giving it ultralow thermal conductivity and record thermoelectric performance.
Liquid-like thermoelectrics
Liquid-like thermoelectrics are materials where mobile ions diffuse through a rigid crystal framework, suppressing heat conduction; prototype copper selenide reached zT = 1.5 at 1,000 K in 2012.
Liquid-like-ion thermoelectrics (superionic Cu2Se)
Liquid-like-ion thermoelectrics are thermoelectric materials where liquid-like mobile ions coexist with a rigid crystal framework; copper selenide, Cu2Se, is the leading example, formalized in 2012 as the phonon-liquid electron-crystal paradigm.
Liquid-metal catalysts
Liquid-metal catalysts are metals or alloys, mainly gallium-based ones like EGaIn and Galinstan, whose fluid surfaces catalyze reactions such as carbon dioxide reduction and resist coking.
Liquid-phase exfoliation
Liquid-phase exfoliation (LPE) is a top-down method that separates bulk layered crystals in a liquid into ultrathin nanosheets, the principal route for producing graphene and other 2D materials at scale.
Liquid-phase microextraction
Liquid-phase microextraction (LPME), also called liquid-liquid microextraction, is an analytical chemistry technique that extracts and preconcentrates analytes from liquid samples into a few microliters of solvent before instrumental analysis.
Liquid-phase transmission electron microscopy
Liquid-phase transmission electron microscopy, also called liquid cell TEM, seals a liquid sample in a cell so processes like nanoparticle growth and electrochemical reactions can be imaged live.
Liquid–liquid critical point
A liquid–liquid critical point (LLCP) is a temperature and pressure at which two distinct liquid phases of a single substance, differing in density, become indistinguishable.
Liquid–liquid extraction
Liquid–liquid extraction, also called solvent extraction, is a separation method in which a solute transfers between two immiscible liquids according to its differing solubilities in each.
Liquid–liquid phase transition in dense hydrogen
The liquid–liquid phase transition (LLPT) in dense hydrogen is a proposed first-order transition between insulating molecular and conducting metallic atomic liquids, relevant to Jupiter's and Saturn's interiors.
Liquid–liquid transition
A liquid–liquid transition (LLT) is a first-order phase transition between two distinct liquid states of the same substance, differing in density and local structure, demonstrated in silicon and hypothesized in supercooled water.
Lisa Kewley
Lisa Kewley is an Australian astronomer who studies how galaxies formed and evolved over 12 billion years, and has directed the Center for Astrophysics | Harvard & Smithsonian since 2022.
Lisa Randall
Lisa Randall is a theoretical particle physicist and cosmologist at Harvard University, best known for the Randall–Sundrum model proposing a warped extra dimension to explain gravity's weakness.
Lisa Tauxe
Lisa Tauxe is a geophysicist at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography known for reconstructing the past intensity of Earth's magnetic field; she was elected to the National Academy of Sciences in 2015.