Non-equilibrium anisotropic colloidal single crystal growth with DNA.
basic_science · Level V
Where this comes from
- Record sourced from PubMed, PMID 30385762.
- Also identified by DOI 10.1038/s41467-018-06982-9 and PMC identifier 6212572.
- Licence recorded as CC BY.
- The licence permits redistribution, so the abstract is shown in full and the full text is available from the publisher.
Abstract
Anisotropic colloidal crystals are materials with novel optical and electronic properties. However, experimental observations of colloidal single crystals have been limited to relatively isotropic habits. Here, we show DNA-mediated crystallization of two types of nanoparticles with different hydrodynamic radii that form highly anisotropic, hexagonal prism microcrystals with AB<sub>2</sub> crystallographic symmetry. The DNA directs the nanoparticles to assemble into a non-equilibrium crystal shape that is enclosed by the highest surface energy facets (AB<sub>2</sub>(10[Formula: see text]0) and AB<sub>2</sub>(0001)). Simulations and theoretical arguments show that this observation is a consequence of large energy barriers between different terminations of the AB<sub>2</sub>(10[Formula: see text]0) facet, which results in a significant deceleration of the (10[Formula: see text]0) facet growth rate. In addition to reporting a hexagonal colloidal crystal habit, this work introduces a potentially general plane multiplicity mechanism for growing non-equilibrium crystal shapes, an advance that will be useful for designing colloidal crystal habits with important applications in both optics and photocatalysis.
Medical subject headings
- Anisotropy
- Colloids
- Crystallization
- Crystallography
- DNA
- Nanoparticles