Acoustic streaming in two-dimensional freely suspended smectic liquid crystal films.

We study horizontal streaming excited by means of a low-frequency and low-intensity acoustic wave in 2D freely suspended films of thermotropic smectic liquid crystals. Acoustic pressure induces fast periodic transverse oscillations of the film, which produce in-plane stationary couples of vortices slowly rotating in opposite directions owing to hydrodynamic nonlinearity. The parameters of the vortices are measured using a new method, based on tracking solidlike disk-shaped islands.