Issue 31, 2016

Critical Casimir interactions between Janus particles

Abstract

Recently there has been strong experimental and theoretical interest in studying the self-assembly and the phase behavior of patchy and Janus particles, which form colloidal suspensions. Although in this quest a variety of effective interactions have been proposed and used in order to achieve a directed assembly, the critical Casimir effect stands out as being particularly suitable in this respect because it provides both attractive and repulsive interactions as well as the potential of a sensitive temperature control of their strength. Specifically, we have calculated the critical Casimir force between a single Janus particle and a laterally homogeneous substrate as well as a substrate with a chemical step. We have used the Derjaguin approximation and compared it with results from full mean field theory. A modification of the Derjaguin approximation turns out to be generally reliable. Based on this approach we have derived the effective force and the effective potential between two Janus cylinders as well as between two Janus spheres.

Graphical abstract: Critical Casimir interactions between Janus particles

Article information

Article type
Paper
Submitted
27 Apr 2016
Accepted
13 Jun 2016
First published
22 Jul 2016
This article is Open Access
Creative Commons BY license

Soft Matter, 2016,12, 6621-6648

Critical Casimir interactions between Janus particles

M. Labbé-Laurent and S. Dietrich, Soft Matter, 2016, 12, 6621 DOI: 10.1039/C6SM00990E

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