Topological Metadefects: Tangles of Dislocations

The concept of topological defects is universal. In condensed matter, it applies to disclinations, dislocations, or vortices that are fingerprints of symmetry breaking during phase transitions. Using as a generic example the tangles of dislocations, we introduce the concept of topological metadefects, i.e., defects made of defects. We show that in cholesterics, dextrogyre and levogyre primary tangles are generated through the D2→C2 symmetry breaking from the coplanar dislocation pair called Lehmann cluster submitted to a high enough tensile strain. The primary tangles can be wound up individually into double helices. They can also annihilate in pairs or associate into tangles of higher orders following simple algebraic rules.