Almost critical behavior of the anchoring energy at the interface between a nematic liquid crystal and a SiO substrate.

Sandro Fae t t i , ( 1 ) ' ( 2 ) Marta Gat t i , ( 1 ) Vincenzo Palleschi, ( 1 ) and Timothy J. S luck in ( 3 ) ' ( a ) Dipartimento di Fisica dell' Universita di Pisa, 56100 Pisa, Italy ^Gruppo Nazionale di Struttura della Materia del Consiglio Nazionale delle Richerche, 56100 Pisa, Italy Institut Max von Laue Paul Langevin, 38042 Grenoble Cedex, France, and Department of Mathematics, University of Southampton, Southampton S04 5NH, England (Received 9 April 1985)