Dynamics and flow effects in the Beris-Edwards system modelling nematic liquid crystals

Abstract: We consider the Beris-Edwards system modelling incompressible liquid crystal flows of nematic type. This couples a Navier-Stokes system for the fluid velocity with a parabolic reaction-convection-diffusion equation for the Q-tensors describing the direction of liquid crystal molecules. In this paper, we study the effect that the flow has on the dynamics of the Q-tensors, by considering two fundamental aspects: the preservation of eigenvalue-range and the dynamical emergence of defects in the limit of high Ericksen number