  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
