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Published on: August 4, 2017
Growth of columnar hydrogel colloidal crystals in water-organic solvent mixture
Jun Zhou1, Tong Cai, Shijun Tang
1Department of Physics, University of North Texas, P.O. Box 311427, Denton, Texas 76203, USA.
Abstract:
A novel emulsion method has been demonstrated to grow columnar hydrogel colloidal crystals by mixing an aqueous suspension of poly-N-isopropylacrylamide-co-allylamine microgels with organic solvent, driven by the coalescence of micelles consisting of organic oil droplets coated by many microgels. This method leads to microgel colloidal crystals of several centimeters growing from the top to the bottom along the gravity direction. Both temperature and polymer concentration play critical roles for the formation of columnar crystals. A phase diagram has been determined, and it can be used as a guide to selectively grow different crystals, including columnar crystals and randomly oriented crystals, and enable the coexistence of columnar crystals and randomly oriented crystals.
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