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Updated: Apr 16, 2026
Confocal Imaging of Confined Quiescent and Flowing Colloid-polymer Mixtures
Published on: May 20, 2014
Direct visualization of spatiotemporal structure of self-assembled colloidal particles in electrohydrodynamic flow of
Yuji Sasaki1, Hikaru Hoshikawa1, Takafumi Seto1
1†Division of Applied Physics, Faculty of Engineering, Hokkaido University, North 13 West 8, Kita-ku, Sapporo, Hokkaido 060-8628, Japan.
Abstract:
Characterization of spatiotemporal dynamics is of vital importance to soft matter systems far from equilibrium. Using a confocal laser scanning microscopy, we directly reveal three-dimensional motion of surface-modified particles in the electrohydrodynamic convection of a nematic liquid crystal. Particularly, visualizing a caterpillar-like motion of a self-assembled colloidal chain demonstrates the mechanism of the persistent transport enabled by the elastic, electric, and hydrodynamic contributions. We also precisely show how the particles' trajectory is spatially modified by simply changing the surface boundary condition.
