Structure and interactions in fluids of prolate colloidal ellipsoids: Comparison between experiment, theory, and simulation

Photo-Crosslinkable Colloids: From Fluid Structure and Dynamics of Spheres to Suspensions of Ellipsoids

Recently-developed photo-crosslinkable PMMA (polymethylmethacrylate) colloidal spheres are a highly promising system for fundamental studies in colloidal physics and may have a wide range of future technological applications. We synthesize these colloids and characterize their size distribution. Their swelling in a density- and index- matching organic solvent system is demonstrated and we employ dynamic light scattering (DLS), as also the recently-developed confocal differential dynamic microscopy (ConDDM), to characterize the structure and the dynamics of a fluid bulk suspension of such colloids at different particle densities, detecting significant particle charging effects. We stretch these photo-crosslinkable spheres into ellipsoids. The fact that the ellipsoids are cross-linked allows them to be fluorescently stained, permitting a dense suspension of ellipsoids, a simple model of fluid matter, to be imaged by direct confocal microscopy.

Dipolar colloids in apolar media: direct microscopy of two-dimensional suspensions

Spherical colloids, in an absence of external fields, are commonly assumed to interact solely through rotationally-invariant potentials, u(r). While the presence of permanent dipoles in aqueous suspensions has been previously suggested by some experiments, the rotational degrees of freedom of spherical colloids are typically neglected. We prove, by direct experiments, the presence of permanent dipoles in commonly used spherical poly(methyl methacrylate) (PMMA) colloids, suspended in an apolar organic medium. We study, by a combination of direct confocal microscopy, computer simulations, and theory, the structure and other thermodynamical properties of organic suspensions of colloidal spheres, confined to a two-dimensional (2D) monolayer. Our studies reveal the effects of the dipolar interactions on the structure and the osmotic pressure of these fluids. These observations have far-reaching consequences for the fundamental colloidal science, opening new directions in self-assembly of complex colloidal clusters.

Structural Transition in a Fluid of Spheroids: A Low-Density Vestige of Jamming

A thermodynamically equilibrated fluid of hard spheroids is a simple model of liquid matter. In this model, the coupling between the rotational degrees of freedom of the constituent particles and their translations may be switched off by a continuous deformation of a spheroid of aspect ratio t into a sphere (t=1). We demonstrate, by experiments, theory, and computer simulations, that dramatic nonanalytic changes in structure and thermodynamics of the fluids take place, as the coupling between rotations and translations is made to vanish. This nonanalyticity, reminiscent of a second-order liquid-liquid phase transition, is not a trivial consequence of the shape of an individual particle. Rather, free volume considerations relate the observed transition to a similar nonanalyticity at t=1 in structural properties of jammed granular ellipsoids. This observation suggests a deep connection to exist between the physics of jamming and the thermodynamics of simple fluids.

Strong effect of weak charging in suspensions of anisotropic colloids

Suspensions of hard colloidal particles frequently serve as model systems in studies on fundamental aspects of phase transitions. But often colloidal particles that are considered as "hard" are in fact weakly charged. If the colloids are spherical, weak charging has only a weak effect on the structural properties of the suspension, which can be easily corrected for. However, this does not hold for anisotropic particles. We introduce a model for the interaction potential between charged ellipsoids of revolution (spheroids) based on the Derjaguin approximation of Debye-Hückel theory and present a computer simulation study on aspects of the system's structural properties and phase behaviour. In line with previous experimental observations, we find that even a weak surface charge has a strong impact on the correlation functions. A likewise strong impact is seen on the phase behaviour, in particular, we find stable cubatic order in suspensions of oblate ellipsoids.

Locating particles accurately in microscope images requires image-processing kernels to be rotationally symmetric

Computerized image-analysis routines deployed widely to locate and track the positions of particles in microscope images include several steps where images are convolved with kernels to remove noise. In many common implementations, some kernels are rotationally asymmetric. Here we show that the use of these asymmetric kernels creates significant artifacts, distorting apparent particle positions in a way that gives the artificial appearance of orientational crystalline order, even in such fully-disordered isotropic systems as simple fluids of hard-sphere-like colloids. We rectify this problem by replacing all asymmetric kernels with rotationally-symmetric kernels, which does not impact code performance. We show that these corrected codes locate particle positions properly, restoring measured isotropy to colloidal fluids. We also investigate rapidly-formed colloidal sediments, and with the corrected codes show that these sediments, often thought to be amorphous, may exhibit strong orientational correlations among bonds between neighboring colloidal particles.