Related papers: Magnetocapillary self-assemblies: locomotion and m…
Physics governing the locomotion of microorganisms and other microsystems is dominated by viscous damping. An effective swimming strategy involves the non-reciprocal and periodic deformations of the considered body. Here, we show that a…
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…
When tiny soft ferromagnetic particles are placed along a liquid interface and exposed to a vertical magnetic field, the balance between capillary attraction and magnetic repulsion leads to self-organization into well-defined patterns.…
Small objects floating on a fluid have a tendency to aggregate due to capillary forces. This effect has been used, with the help of a magnetic induction field, to assemble submillimeter metallic spheres into a variety of structures, whose…
In the study of microscopic flows, self-propulsion has been particularly topical in recent years, with the rise of miniature artificial swimmers as a new tool for flow control, low Reynolds number mixing, micromanipulation or even drug…
The fabrication of novel soft materials is an important scientific and technological challenge. We investigate the response of magnetic ellipsoidal particles adsorbed at fluid-fluid interfaces to external magnetic fields. By exploiting…
Capillarity-driven self-assembly at fluidic interfaces offers a scalable route to large, reconfigurable materials. Microscale particles with high horizontal-to-vertical aspect ratios become attractive building blocks for shape-directed…
The spontaneous organization of particles at the boundary between two fluids is a common occurrence. Scientists have extensively investigated various internal and external factors to manipulate and guide these self-assembly processes. This…
Self-assembly of nanoparticles at fluid-fluid interfaces is a promising route to fabricate functional materials from the bottom-up. However, directing and controlling particles into highly tunable and predictable structures -- while…
It is well-known that magnetic forces can induce a formation of densely packed strings of magnetic particles or even sheafs of several strings (spindles). Here we show that in a sufficiently strong magnetic field, more complex aggregates of…
When ferromagnetic particles are suspended at an interface under magnetic fields, dipole-dipole interactions compete with capillary attraction. This combination of forces has recently given promising results towards controllable…
Active systems contain self-propelled particles and can spontaneously self-organize into patterns making them attractive candidates for the self-assembly of smart soft materials. One key limitation of our present understanding of these…
Particles with directional interactions are promising building blocks for new functional materials and may serve as models for biological structures. Mutually attractive nanoparticles that are deformable due to flexible surface groups, for…
The fluid-fluid interface is a complex environment for a floating object where the statics and dynamics may be governed by capillarity, gravity, inertia, and other external body forces. Yet, the alignment of these forces in intricate ways…
Collective control of mobile microrobotic swarms is indispensable for their potential high-impact applications in targeted drug delivery, medical diagnostics, parallel micromanipulation, and environmental sensing and remediation. Lack of…
Recent experiments have shown that floating ferromagnetic beads, under the influence of an oscillating background magnetic field, can move along a liquid-air interface in a sustained periodic locomotion [Lumay et al., Soft Matter, 2013, 9,…
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…
Capillary interactions can be used to direct assembly of particles adsorbed at fluid-fluid interfaces. Precisely controlling the magnitude and direction of capillary interactions to assemble particles into favoured structures for materials…
Colloidal assembly at fluid interfaces has a great potential for the bottom-up fabrication of novel structured materials. However, challenges remain in realizing controllable and tunable assembly of particles into diverse structures.…
Mobile microrobots are envisioned to be useful in a wide range of high-impact applications, many of which requiring cohesive group formation to maintain self-bounded swarms in the absence of confining boundaries. Cohesive group formation…