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research article

Active apolar doping determines routes to colloidal clusters and gels

Massana-Cid, Helena
•
Codina, Joan
•
Pagonabarraga, Ignacio
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October 16, 2018
Proceedings Of The National Academy Of Sciences Of The United States Of America (PNAS)

Collections of interacting active particles, self-propelling or not, have shown remarkable phenomena including the emergence of dynamic patterns across different length scales, from animal groups to vibrated grains, microtubules, bacteria, and chemicalor field-driven colloids. Burgeoning experimental and simulation activities are now exploring the possibility of realizing solid and stable structures from passive elements that are assembled by a few active dopants. Here we show that such an elusive task may be accomplished by using a small amount of apolar dopants, namely synthetic active but not self-propelling units. We use blue light to rapidly assemble 2D colloidal clusters and gels via nonequilibrium diffusiophoresis, where microscopic hematite dockers form long-living interstitial bonds that strongly glue passive silica microspheres. By varying the relative fraction of doping, we uncover a rich phase diagram including ordered and disordered clusters, space-filling gels, and bicontinuous structures formed by filamentary dockers percolating through a solid network of silica spheres. We characterize the slow relaxation and dynamic arrest of the different phases via correlation and scattering functions. Our findings provide a pathway toward the rapid engineering of mesoscopic gels and clusters via active colloidal doping.

  • Details
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Type
research article
DOI
10.1073/pnas.1811225115
Web of Science ID

WOS:000447491300045

Author(s)
Massana-Cid, Helena
Codina, Joan
Pagonabarraga, Ignacio
Tierno, Pietro
Date Issued

2018-10-16

Publisher

National Academy of Sciences

Published in
Proceedings Of The National Academy Of Sciences Of The United States Of America (PNAS)
Volume

115

Issue

42

Start page

10618

End page

10623

Subjects

Multidisciplinary Sciences

•

Science & Technology - Other Topics

•

active systems

•

colloids

•

gels

•

particles

•

dynamics

•

motile

Editorial or Peer reviewed

REVIEWED

Written at

EPFL

EPFL units
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Available on Infoscience
December 13, 2018
Use this identifier to reference this record
https://infoscience.epfl.ch/handle/20.500.14299/152598
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