Related papers: Gelling by Heating
We investigate the thermodynamics and percolation regimes of model binary mixtures of patchy colloidal particles. The particles of each species have three sites of two types, one of which promotes bonding of particles of the same species…
We investigate the gel formation from the equilibrium sol phase in a simple model that has the characteristics of (colloidal) gel-forming systems at a finite temperature. At low volume fraction and low temperatures, particles are linked by…
We study the phase diagram of a binary mixture of patchy particles which has been designed to form a reversible gel. For this we perform Monte Carlo and molecular dynamics simulations to investigate the thermodynamics of such a system and…
Patchy colloidal model with three and four equivalent patches, confined in the attractive random porous media, undergo re-entrant gas-liquid phase separation with the possibility for the liquid phase density to approach zero. This unusual…
This article discusses recent attempts to provide a deeper understanding of the thermoreversible "gel" state of colloidal matter and to unravel the analogies between gels at the colloidal level and gels at the molecular level, commonly…
We consider patchy gold nanoparticles decorated by liquid crystalline ligands. The cases of two, three, four and six symmetrically arranged patches of ligands are discussed, as well as the cases of their equatorial and uniform arrangement.…
We discuss a class of models for particulate gels in which the particle contacts are described by an effective interaction combining a two-body attraction and a three-body angular repulsion. Using molecular dynamics, we show how varying the…
The melting of a binary system of charged particles confined in a {\it quasi}-one-dimensional parabolic channel is studied through Monte Carlo simulations. At zero temperature the particles are ordered in parallel chains. The melting is…
We introduce a simple spherical model whose structural properties are similar to the ones generated by models with directional interactions, by employing a binary mixture of large and small hard spheres, with a square-well attraction acting…
Glasses and gels are the two dynamically arrested, disordered states of matter. Despite their importance, their similarities and differences remain elusive, especially at high density. We identify dynamical and structural signatures which…
The competition of depletion attractions and longer-ranged repulsions between colloidal particles in colloid-polymer mixtures leads to the formation of heterogeneous gel-like structures. For instance, gel networks, i.e., states where the…
Dynamical heterogeneities in a colloidal fluid close to gelation are studied by means of computer simulations. A clear distinction between some fast particles and the rest, slow ones, is observed, yielding a picture of the gel composed by…
Colloidal gels are a prototypical example of a heterogeneous network solid whose complex properties are governed by thermally-activated dynamics. In this Letter we experimentally establish the connection between the intermittent dynamics of…
We report a detailed computational study by Brownian Dynamics simulations of the structure and dynamics of a liquid of patchy particles which develops an amorphous tetrahedral network upon decreasing temperature. The highly directional…
Using molecular dynamics simulations we study the temperature-density phase diagram of a simple model system of particles in two dimensions. In addition to translational degrees of freedom, each particle has two internal states and…
Within the framework of the random distribution assumption of cyclic bonds, the preceding theory of gelation is extended to mixing systems with various functionalities. To examine the validity of the assumption, the theory is applied to…
We report an experimental investigation of the caging motion in a uniformly heated granular fluid, for a wide range of filling fractions, $\phi$. At low $\phi$ the classic diffusive behavior of a fluid is observed. However, as $\phi$ is…
Molecular dynamics simulations have been employed to study the formation of a physical (thermoreversible) gel by amphiphilic A-B-A triblock copolymers in aqueous solution. In order to mimic the structure of hydrogel-forming polypeptides…
We propose a novel molecular device that pumps heat against a thermal gradient. The system consists of a molecular element connecting two thermal reservoirs that are characterized by different spectral properties. The pumping action is…
We investigate a simple model corresponding to particles driven in opposite directions and interacting via a repulsive potential. The particles move off-lattice on a periodic strip and are subject to random forces as well. We show that this…