Related papers: Fast and rewritable colloidal assembly via field s…
Flexibility governs the many properties of materials and is crucial for the function of proteins and biopolymers. However, how the self-assembly of flexibly bonded particles can lead to larger structures with global reconfigurability is…
Detailed control over the motion of colloidal particles is relevant in many applications in colloidal science such as lab-on-a-chip devices. Here, we use an external magnetic field to assemble paramagnetic colloidal spheres into colloidal…
The aggregation of attractive colloids has been extensively studied from both theoretical and experimental perspectives as the fraction of solid particles is changed, and the range, type and strength of attractive or repulsive forces…
We use confocal microscopy to study the motions of particles in concentrated colloidal systems. Near the glass transition, diffusive motion is inhibited, as particles spend time trapped in transient ``cages'' formed by neighboring…
Metallic nanoparticles offer possibilities to build basic electric devices with new functionality and improved performance. Due to the small volume and the resulting low self-capacitance, each single nanoparticle exhibits a high charging…
Designing protocols to dynamically direct the self-assembly of colloidal particles has become an important direction in soft matter physics because of the promising applications in fabrication of dynamic responsive functional materials.…
The self-assembly of binary nanoparticle superlattices from colloidal mixtures is a promising method for the fabrication of complex colloidal co-crystal structures. However, binary mixtures often form amorphous or metastable phases instead…
Particle shape and medium chirality are two key features recently used to control anisotropic colloidal self-assembly and dynamics in liquid crystals. Here, we study magnetically responsive gourd-shaped colloidal particles dispersed in…
Chiral active particles are able to draw energy from the environment to self-propel in the form of rotation. We describe an experimental arrangement wherein chiral objects, spinners, floating on the surface of a vibrated fluid rotate due to…
Active elastomeric liquid crystal particles with initial cylindrical shapes are obtained by means of soft lithography and polymerization in a strong magnetic field. Gold nanocrystals infiltrated into these particles mediate energy transfer…
Topological protection ensures stability of information and particle transport against perturbations. We explore experimentally and computationally the topologically protected transport of magnetic colloids above spatially inhomogeneous…
Self-assembly is one of the crucial mechanisms allowing to design multifunctional materials. Soft hybrid materials contain components of different nature and exhibit competitive interactions which drive self-organisation into structures of…
Magnetization reversal in magnetic particles is one of the fundamental issues in magnetic data storage. Technological improvements require the understanding of dynamical magnetization reversal processes at nanosecond time scales. New…
Combining topology and plasmonics paradigms in nanocolloidal systems may enable new means of pre-engineering desired composite material properties. Here we design and realize orientationally ordered assemblies of noble metal nanoparticles…
We demonstrate that directed transport of particles in a two dimensional driven lattice can be dynamically reversed multiple times by superimposing additional spatially localized lattices on top of a background lattice. The timescales of…
Colloidal crystals formed by size-asymmetric binary particles co-assemble into a wide variety of colloidal compounds with lattices akin to ionic crystals. Recently, a transition from a compound phase with a sublattice of small particles to…
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…
Two-dimensional colloidal suspensions exposed to periodic external fields exhibit a variety of molecular crystalline phases. There two or more colloids assemble at lattice sites of potential minima to build new structural entities, referred…
In the presence of a magnetic field applied perpendicular to a thin sample layer, a suspension of magnetic colloidal particles (ferrofluid) can form spatially modulated phases with a characteristic length determined by the competition…
We propose a hybrid soliton-based system consisting of a centrosymmetric photorefractive crystal, supporting photorefractive solitons, coupled to a vertical cavity surface emitting laser, supporting multistable cavity solitons. The…