Related papers: Optoelectronically Directed Self-Assembly of Activ…
Artificial soft matter systems have appeared as important tools to harness mechanical motion for microscale manipulation. Typically, this motion is driven either by the external fields or by mutual interaction between the colloids. In the…
We use computer simulation to investigate the self-assembly of Janus-like amphiphilic peanut-shaped nanoparticles, finding phases of clusters, bilayers and micelles in accord with ideas of packing familiar from the study of molecular…
Cholesteric liquid crystals can exhibit spatial patterns in molecular alignment at interfaces that can be exploited for particle assembly. These patterns emerge from the competition between bulk and surface energies, tunable with the system…
Rational control over the periodic arrangement of particles by means of external stimuli is a technologically important aspect of colloidal science with important physical underpinnings. Here, a robust structural control of particle…
Simple local interactions can cause primitive building blocks to self-assemble into complex and functional patterns. However, even for a small number of blocks, there exist a vast number of possible configurations that are plausible,…
Self-assembly of complex and functional materials remains a grand challenge in soft material science. Efficient assembly depends on a delicate balance between thermodynamic and kinetic effects, requiring fine-tuning affinities and…
We carry out numerical studies of static packings of frictionless superellipsoidal particles in three spatial dimensions. We consider more than $200$ different particle shapes by varying the three shape parameters that define…
Nanocrystals (NCs) serve as versatile building blocks for the creation of functional materials, with NC self-assembly offering opportunities to enable novel material properties. Here, we demonstrate that PbS NCs functionalized with strongly…
We study how dispersions of colloidal particles in a cholesteric liquid crystal behave under a time-dependent electric field. By controlling the amplitude and shape of the applied field wave, we show that the system can be reproducibly…
Periodic assemblies of nanoparticles are central to surface patterning, with applications in biosensing, energy conversion, and nanofabrication. Evaporation of colloidal droplets on substrates provides a simple yet effective route to…
Organosulfur compounds at the interface to noble metals have proved over the last decades to be extremely versatile systems for both fundamental and applied research. However, the anchoring of thiols to gold remained an object of…
Interactions between active individuals in animal collectives lead to emergent responses that remain elusive in synthetic soft matter. Here, shape-morphing polymers are used to create bio-inspired transient solids that self-assemble with…
Colloidal Janus spheres in water (one hemisphere attractive and the other repulsive) assemble into two-dimensional hexagonal crystals with orientational order controlled by anisotropic interactions. We exploit the decoupled translational…
The kinetic paths of structural evolution and formation of block copolymer (BCP) particles are explored using dynamic self-consistent field theory (DSCFT). It is shown that the process-directed self-assembly of BCP immersed in a poor…
A novel type of hybrid colloids is presented, based on the association of several polymeric systems and ferrofluids. On the one hand, we use inorganic nanoparticles made of magnetic iron oxide prepared at the LI2C, which response to a…
Electrostatic interactions play an important role in numerous self-assembly phenomena, including colloidal aggregation. Although colloids typically have a dielectric constant that differs from the surrounding solvent, the effective…
This article reviews recent inverse statistical-mechanical methodologies that we have devised to optimize interaction potentials in soft matter systems that correspond to stable "target" structures. We are interested in finding the…
Anisotropic particles oriented in a specific direction can act as artificial atoms and molecules, and their controlled assembly can result in a wide variety of ordered structures. Towards this, we demonstrate the orientation transitions of…
The precise arrangement of microscopic objects is critical to the development of functional materials and ornately patterned surfaces. Here, we present an acoustics-based method for the rapid arrangement of microscopic particles into…
Colloidal assembly represents a powerful method for the fabrication of functional materials. In this article, we describe how acoustic radiation forces can guide the assembly of colloidal particles into structures that serve as microscopic…