Related papers: Self-propelling colloidal finite state machines
The possibility to align and organize faceted particles in the bulk offers intriguing possibilities for the design and discovery of materials and architectures exhibiting novel functional properties. The growth of ice crystals can be used…
Gels in soft-matter systems are an important nonergodic state of matter. We study a colloid-polymer mixture which is quenched by increasing the polymer concentration, from a fluid to a gel. Using confocal microscopy, we study both the…
Mechanical metamaterials, whose unique mechanical properties stem from their structural design rather than material constituents, are gaining popularity in engineering applications. In particular, recent advances in self-assembly techniques…
We study the appearance and properties of cluster crystals (solids in which the unit cell is occupied by a cluster of particles) in a two-dimensional system of self-propelled active Brownian particles with repulsive interactions.…
Field induced assembly of reconfigurable structures with complex hierarchical configurations has recently become an area of intense research with the promise for exciting applications in programmable self-assembly and nano/microstructure…
Microgels are often discussed as well-suited model system for soft colloids. In contrast to rigid spheres, the microgel volume and, coupled to this, the volume fraction in dispersion can be manipulated by external stimuli. This behavior is…
Self-diffusiophoretic particles exploit local concentration gradients of a solute species in order to self-propel at the micron scale. While an isolated chemically- and geometrically-isotropic particle cannot swim, we show that it can…
Self-propelled particles include both self-phoretic synthetic colloids and various micro-organisms. By continually consuming energy, they bypass the laws of equilibrium thermodynamics. These laws enforce the Boltzmann distribution in…
Colloidal particles can create reconfigurable nanomaterials, with applications such as color-changing, self-repairing, and self-regulating materials and reconfigurable drug delivery systems. However, top-down methods for manipulating…
Microgels are colloidal-scale particles individually made of crosslinked polymer networks that can swell and deswell in response to external stimuli, such as changes to temperature or pH. Despite a large amount of experimental activities on…
This article introduces new tools to study self-organisation in a family of simple cellular automata which contain some particle-like objects with good collision properties (coalescence) in their time evolution. We draw an initial…
Living organisms are molecular systems with self-sustained dynamics via energy conversion through molecular cooperation, resulting in highly complex macroscopic behaviors. Construction of such autonomous macroscopic dynamics at a molecular…
Using Brownian dynamics computer simulations we show that a two-dimensional suspension of self-propelled ("active") colloidal particles crystallizes at sufficiently high densities. Compared to the equilibrium freezing of passive particles…
Dynamical clustering represents a characteristic feature of active matter consisting of self-propelled agents that convert energy from the environment into mechanical motion. At the micron scale, typical of overdamped dynamics, particles…
At low temperatures, colloidal particles with short-range attractive and long-range repulsive interactions can form various periodic microphases in bulk.In this paper, we investigate the self-assembly behaviour of colloids with competing…
Highly entangled states called cluster states are a universal resource for measurement-based quantum computing (QC). Here we propose an efficient method for producing large cluster states using superconducting quantum circuits. We show that…
The self-assembly of anisotropic building blocks into complex spatial architectures is an important design strategy in material science but the mechanisms by which the anisotropic interactions influence the early-stage growth and formation…
We study the designing principles of the simplest colloidal propeller, an architecture built from four identical spheres that can couple translation with rotation to produce controlled drift motion. By considering superparamagnetic beads,…
Self-assembly is a ubiquitous process in synthetic and biological systems, broadly defined as the spontaneous organization of multiple subunits (e.g. macromolecules, particles) into ordered multi-unit structures. The vast majority of…
Active solids emerge from self-actuating components interacting with each other to form crystalline patterns. In equilibrium, commensurability underpins our understanding of nanoscale friction and particle-level dynamics of crystals.…