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Nanoporous media exhibit structures significantly smaller than the wavelengths of visible light and can thus act as photonic metamaterials. Their optical functionality is not determined by the properties of the base materials, but rather by…
Self-assembly processes allow us to design and create complex nanostructures using molecules as building blocks and surfaces as scaffolds. This autonomous driven construction is possible due to a complex thermodynamic balance of…
The study of metallic nanoparticles has a long tradition in linear and nonlinear optics [1], with current emphasis on the ultrafast dynamics, size, shape and collective effects in their optical response [2-6]. Nanoparticles also represent…
By converting energy into mechanical work, engines play a central role in most biological and technological processes. In particular, within the current trend towards the development of nanoscience and nanotechnology, microscopic engines…
Self-propelled colloidal objects, such as motile bacteria or synthetic microswimmers, have microscopically irreversible individual dynamics - a feature they share with all living systems. The incoherent behaviour of individual swimmers can…
Depending on its adsorption conformation on the Au(111) surface, a zwitterionic single-molecule machine works in two different ways under bias voltage pulses. It is a unidirectional rotor while anchored on the surface. It is a fast-drivable…
Self-propelled chemically powered synthetic micron and nano-scale motors are being intensively studied because of the wide range of potential applications that exploit their directed motion. This paper considers even smaller…
Active colloids, also known as artificial microswimmers, are self-propelled micro and nanoparticles that convert uniform sources of fuel (e.g. chemical) or uniform external driving fields (e.g. magnetic or electric) into directed motion by…
Rotation in micro/nanoscale provides extensive applications in mechanical actuation$^{1, 2}$, cargo delivery$^{3, 4}$, and biomolecule manipulation$^{5, 6}$. Light can be used to induce a mechanical rotation remotely, instantly and…
Rigorous understanding of the self-assembly of colloidal nanocrystals is crucial to the development of tailored nanostructured materials. Despite extensive studies, a mechanistic understanding of self-assembly under non-equilibrium driven…
Development of artificial materials exhibiting unusual optical properties is one of the major strands of current photonics research. Of particular interest are soft-matter systems reconfigurable by external stimuli that play an important…
We demonstrate a novel method to assemble and transport swarms of colloidal particles by combining liquid crystals enabled electrophoresis and photo-sensitive surface patterning. Colloidal particles are propelled in a nematic liquid crystal…
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…
Biological cells self-organize into living materials that uniquely blend structure with functionality and responsiveness to the environment. The integration of similar life-like features in man-made materials remains challenging, yet…
Colloidal nanoparticles developed as interesting objects to establish two- or three-dimensional super-structures with properties not known from conventional bulk materials. Beyond, the properties can be tuned and quantum effects can be…
Custom-designed colloidal particles in an optical tweezers act as light-mills in a fluid. In particular, aqueous suspensions of capped colloids, in which half of the surface is covered with metal layers, are investigated. Due to their…
Recent advances in the field of active soft matter promise a lot. Both, experimental advances and theoretical understanding point towards new material classes in reach, for example self-healing materials that might switch their properties…
We demonstrate facile optical manipulation of shape of birefringent colloidal microparticles made from liquid crystal elastomers. Using soft lithography and polymerization, we fabricate elastomeric microcylinders with weakly undulating…
Tremendous enhancement of light-matter interaction in plasmon-excited molecular hybrid devices allows for non-linearities on the level of single emitters and few photons. This promises a plethora of novel applications like single photon…
The optical binding of many particles has great potential to achieve the wide-area formation of a "crystal" of small materials. Unlike conventional optical binding, where the whole assembly of targeted particles is irradiated with light, if…