Effect of particle polydispersity on the irreversible adsorption of fine particles on patterned substrates

We performed extensive Monte Carlo simulations of the irreversible adsorption of polydispersed disks inside the cells of a patterned substrate. The model captures relevant features of the irreversible adsorption of spherical colloidal particles on patterned substrates. The pattern consists of (equal) square cells, where adsorption can take place, centered at the vertices of a square lattice. Two independent, dimensionless parameters are required to control the geometry of the pattern, namely, the cell size and cell-cell distance, measured in terms of the average particle diameter. However, to describe the phase diagram, two additional dimensionless parameters, i.e., the minimum and maximum particle radii, are also required. We find that the transition between any two adjacent regions of the phase diagram solely depends on the largest and smallest particle sizes, but not on the shape of the distribution function of the radii. We consider size dispersions up to 20% of the average radius using a physically motivated, truncated, Gaussian-size distribution, and focus on the regime where adsorbing particles do not interact with those previously adsorbed on neighboring cells to characterize the jammed state structure. The study generalizes previous exact relations on monodisperse particles to account for size dispersion. Due to the presence of the pattern, the coverage shows a nonmonotonic dependence on the cell size. The pattern also affects the radius of adsorbed particles, where one observes preferential adsorption of smaller radii, particularly at high polydispersity.