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Endowing materials with physical intelligence holds the key for a progress leap in robotic systems. In spite of the growing success for macroscopic devices, transferring these concepts to the microscale presents several challenges connected…

Soft Condensed Matter · Physics 2023-03-29 Steven van Kesteren , Laura Alvarez , Silvia Arrese-Igor , Angel Alegria , Lucio Isa

We investigate the mobility of nanometer-size solutes in water in a uniform external electric field. General arguments are presented to show that a closed surface cutting a volume from a polar liquid will carry an effective non-zero surface…

Soft Condensed Matter · Physics 2016-08-24 Mohammadhasan Dinpajooh , Dmitry V. Matyushov

We examine the dynamics of a single colloidal particle driven through a colloidal lattice which can distort in response to the driven particle. We find a remarkably rich variety of dynamical locking phenomena as we vary the angle of the…

Soft Condensed Matter · Physics 2009-11-10 C. Reichhardt , C. J. Olson Reichhardt

The motion of an artificial micro-scale swimmer that uses a chemical reaction catalyzed on its own surface to achieve autonomous propulsion is fully characterized experimentally. It is shown that at short times, it has a substantial…

The transport of motile entities across modulated energy landscapes plays an important role in a range of phenomena in biology, colloidal science and solid-state physics. Here, an easily implementable strategy that allows for the collective…

Soft Condensed Matter · Physics 2020-03-11 Fernando Martínez-Pedrero , Francisco Ortega , Ramón G. Rubio , Carles Calero

Enhanced colloidal transport beyond the limit imposed by diffusion is usually achieved through external fields. Here, we demonstrate the ballistic transport of a colloidal sphere using internal sources of energy provided by an attached…

Soft Condensed Matter · Physics 2017-01-12 Raj Kumar Manna , P. B. Sunil Kumar , R. Adhikari

Liquid transport in microchip-based systems is important in many areas such as Laboratory-on-a-chip, Microfluidics and Optofluidics. Actuation of liquids in such systems is usually achieved using either mechanical displacement11 or via…

Fluid Dynamics · Physics 2011-12-09 Steve Arscott

Magnetic nano/microrotors are passive elements that spin around an axis due to an external rotating field while remaining confined to a close plane. They have been used to date in different applications related to fluid mixing, drug…

Soft Condensed Matter · Physics 2025-01-28 Dolachai Boniface , Arthur V. Straube , Pietro Tierno

Polyoxometalates (POMs) are redox-active molecular oxides, which attract growing interest for their integration into nano-devices, such as high-density data storage non-volatile memories. In this work, we investigated the electrostatic…

We demonstrate several examples of driving and steering of colloids when dispersed in nematic liquid crystals. The driving mechanism is based on the principle of nonlinear electrophoresis which is mediated by the asymmetry in the structure…

Soft Condensed Matter · Physics 2019-08-28 S. Hernàndez-Navarro , P. Tierno , J. Ignés-Mullol , F. Sagués

We introduce a system of light driven microscopic autonomous moving particles that move on a flat surface. The design is simple, yet effective: Micrometer sized objects with wedge shape are produced by photopolymerization, they are covered…

Combining experiments and computer simulations, we use a spatially periodic and flashing light-field to direct the motion of phototactic active colloids. Here, the colloids self-organize into a density spike pattern, which resembles a shock…

Soft Condensed Matter · Physics 2019-05-23 Celia Lozano , Benno Liebchen , Borge ten Hagen , Clemens Bechinger , Hartmut Löwen

Utilizing hot carriers is the crucial approach for solar cell to exceed the thermodynamic detailed balance limit, yet effective extraction of hot carriers in absorber materials via most commonly used semiconductor acceptors has been a…

Molecular motors are essential to the living, they generate additional fluctuations that boost transport and assist assembly. Self-propelled colloids, that consume energy to move, hold similar potential for the man-made assembly of…

Soft Condensed Matter · Physics 2019-09-18 Sophie Ramananarivo , Etienne Ducrot , Jeremie Palacci

We report the investigation of a single quantum dot charge storage device. The device allows selective optical charging of a single dot with electrons, storage of these charges over timescales much longer than microseconds and reliable…

Mesoscale and Nanoscale Physics · Physics 2009-11-13 D. Heiss , V. Jovanov , M. Caesar , M. Bichler , G. Abstreiter , J. J. Finley

Motility is a basic feature of living microorganisms, and how it works is often determined by environmental cues. Recent efforts have focused on develop- ing artificial systems that can mimic microorganisms, and in particular their…

Halide perovskites have remarkable properties for relatively crudely processed semiconductors, including large optical absorption coefficients and long charge carrier lifetimes. Thanks to such properties, these materials are now competing…

Applied Physics · Physics 2019-12-03 Géraud Delport , Stuart Macpherson , Samuel D. Stranks

Attempts to use Electrohydrodynamic (EHD) flow for propulsion have been made since the last century [1]. Limited success has been registered particularly due to the inhomogeneous generation of the thrust, and also the very light weight and…

Plasma Physics · Physics 2019-06-25 Adrian Ieta , Marius Chirita

Discotic liquid crystals can self-align to form one-dimensional semiconducting wires, many tens of microns long. In this letter, we describe the preparation of semiconducting films where the stacking direction of the disc-like molecules is…

Materials Science · Physics 2007-05-23 C. Deibel , D. Janssen , P. Heremans , V. de Cupere , Y. Geerts , M. L. Benkhedir , G. J. Adriaenssens

Conducting submicron particles are well-suited as filler particles in non-conducting polymer matrices to obtain a conducting composite with a low percolation threshold. Going to nanometer-sized filler particles imposes a restriction to the…

Materials Science · Physics 2009-11-13 L. J. Huijbregts , H. B. Brom , J. C. M. Brokken-Zijp , W. E. Kleinjan , M. A. J. Michels