Related papers: Complex Self-Assembly from Simple Interaction Rule…
As a first step to understanding the role of molecular or chemical polydispersity in self-assembly, we put forward a coarse-grained model that describes the spontaneous formation of quasi-linear polymers in solutions containing two…
Hypothesis: Colloidal molecules with anisotropic shapes and interactions are powerful model systems for deciphering the behavior of real molecules and building units for creating materials with designed properties. While many strategies for…
Understanding interactions between microparticles and lipid membranes is of increasing importance, especially for unraveling the influence of microplastics on our health and environment. Here, we study how a short-ranged adhesive force…
The emergence of structure through aggregation is a fascinating topic and of both fundamental and practical interest. Here we demonstrate that self-generated solvent flow can be used to generate long-range attractions on the colloidal…
Self-assembly is traditionally described as the process through which an initially disordered system relaxes towards an equilibrium ordered phase only driven by local interactions between its building blocks. However, This definition is too…
Spontaneous mechanical self-assembly of monodisperse bubbles generally leads to disordered foams at low density: producing crystalline structures such as Kelvin foams has proven to be challenging experimentally, despite them being a minimum…
We report molecular dynamics simulations of a system of repulsive, polymer-tethered colloidal particles. We use an explicit polymer model to explore how the length and the behavior of the polymer (ideal or self-avoiding) affect the ability…
We study the phenomenon of self-assembly of silica micro-spheres on a glass plate during evaporation of the solvent from a colloidal suspension. Our experiments unveil an interesting competition between ordering and compaction in a strongly…
The spontaneous assembly of particles in suspension provides a strategy for inexpensive fabrication of devices with nanometer-scale control, such as single-electron transistors for memory or logic applications. A scaleable and robust method…
Interaction between dipolar forces, such as permanent magnets, generally leads to the formation of one-dimensional chains and rings. We investigated whether it was possible to let dipoles self-assemble into three-dimensional structures by…
Catalytically active colloids maintain non-equilibrium conditions in which they produce and deplete chemicals and hence effectively act as sources and sinks of molecules. While individual colloids that are symmetrically coated do not…
A challenge of molecular self-assembly is to understand how to design particles that self-assemble into a desired structure and not any of a potentially large number of undesired structures. Here we use simulation to show that a strategy of…
The fabrication of versatile building blocks that are reliably self-assemble into desired ordered and disordered phases is amongst the hottest topics in contemporary material science. To this end, microscopic units of varying complexity,…
We introduce a simple dynamical rule in which each particle locates a particle that is farthest from it and moves towards it. Repeated application of this algorithm results in the formation of unusual dynamical patterns: during the process…
The generation of nanoscale square and stripe patterns is of major technological importance since they are compatible with industry-standard electronic circuitry. Recently, a blend of diblock copolymer interacting via hydrogen-bonding was…
Assembly of spherical colloidal particles into extended structures, including linear strings, in the absence of directional interparticle bonding interactions or external perturbation could facilitate the design of new functional materials.…
Molecular self-assembly is a well-known technique to create highly functional nanostructures on surfaces. Self-assembly on two-dimensional materials is a developing field and has already resulted in the discovery of several rich and…
The surprising recent discoveries of quasicrystals and their approximants in soft matter systems poses the intriguing possibility that these structures can be realized in a broad range of nano- and micro-scale assemblies. It has been…
Colloidal self-assembly -- the spontaneous organization of colloids into ordered structures -- has been considered key to produce next-generation materials. However, the present-day staggering variety of colloidal building blocks and the…
We survey our research on modeling the mechanisms of control of uniformity in growth of nanosize and colloid particles. The former are produced as nanocrystals, by burst-nucleation from solution. The latter, colloid-size particles, are…