Abstract The Liquid crystal behavior of twenty-three N-(p-phenylbenzylidene)-p- alkoxycarbonyl-anilines has been examined by optical microscopy and differential scanning calorimetry in order to study the effects of branching of the alkyl groups. Among the results obtained, the following are particularly of interest:(1) the effect of methyl group (s) on the penultimate carbon of the propyl ester on the nematic thermal stabilities is essentially nil ...