Related papers: Structure formation in monolayers composed of hard…
The ordered structure of binary alloy nanoparticles determines their magnetic and catalytic characteristics. In the alloys after annealing, one of the components preferentially segregates on the surface to reduce surface energy. This…
We investigate the physics of ultracold dipolar molecules using path-integral quantum Monte Carlo simulations, and construct the complete phase diagram extending from weak to strong interactions and from small to mesoscopic particle…
Following an approach initially outlined by McKee & Holliman, we investigate the structure and stability of dense, starless molecular cloud cores. We model those as spherical clouds in hydrostatic equilibrium and supported against gravity…
Bulk amorphous materials have been studied extensively and are widely used, yet their atomic arrangement remains an open issue. Although they are generally believed to be Zachariasen continuous random networks, recent experimental evidence…
We use numerical simulations to understand how random deviations from the ideal spherical shape affect the ability of hard particles to form fcc crystalline structures. Using a system of hard spheres as a reference, we determine the…
Shape anisotropy of colloidal nanoparticles has emerged as an important design variable for engineering assemblies with targeted structure and properties. In particular, a number of polyhedral nanoparticles have been shown to exhibit a rich…
Hard convex polyhedra, idealized models for anisotropic colloids and nanoparticles, are known to form variety of orientational phases despite the regular arrangement of particles in the crystalline assemblies. Based on the orientational…
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…
We construct a tensor model for nematic phases of bent-core molecules from molecular theory. The form of free energy is determined by molecular symmetry, which includes the couplings and derivatives of a vector and two second-order tensors,…
Topological defects play a central role in the formation and organization of various biological systems. Historically, such nonequilibrium defects have been mainly studied in the context of homogeneous active nematics. Phase-separated…
Using scaled-particle theory for binary mixtures of two-dimensional hard particles with rotational freedom, we analyse the stability of nematic phases and the demixing phase behaviour of a variety of mixtures, focussing on cases where at…
We study the self-organization of flexible planar trimer particles on a structureless surface. The molecules are made up of two mesogenic units linked by a spacer, all of which are modeled as hard needles of the same length. Each molecule…
Liquid crystals with molecules constrained to the tangent bundle of a curved surface show interesting phenomena resulting from the tight coupling of the elastic and bulk free energies of the liquid crystal with geometric properties of the…
With suitably designed Monte Carlo simulations we have investigated the properties of mobile, impenetrable, yet deformable particles that are immersed into a porous matrix, the latter one realized via a frozen configuration of spherical…
The twist-bend nematic liquid crystal phase is a three-dimensional fluid in which achiral bent molecules spontaneously form an orientationally ordered macroscopically chiral heliconical winding of molecular scale pitch, in absence of…
We study the phase ordering colloids suspended in a thermotropic nematic liquid crystal below the clearing point Tni and the resulting aggregated structure. Small (150nm) PMMA particles are dispersed in a classical liquid crystal matrix,…
Understanding nanoscale mechanisms responsible for the recently discovered ferroelectric nematics can be helped by direct visualization of self-assembly of strongly polar molecules. Here we report on scanning tunneling microscopy (STM)…
Spherical particles confined to a sphere surface cannot pack densely into a hexagonal lattice without defects. In this study, we use hard particle Monte Carlo simulations to determine the effects of continuously deformable shape anisotropy…
The phase behavior of colloidal particles embedded in a binary fluid is influenced by wetting layers surrounding each particle. The free energy of the fluid film depends on its morphology, i.e., on size, shape and connectivity. Under rather…
The change of the structure of concentrated colloidal suspensions upon addition of non-adsorbing polymer is studied within a two-component, Ornstein-Zernicke based liquid state approach. The polymers' conformational degrees of freedom are…