Effect of the Interaction Length on Clusters Formed by Spherical One-Patch Particles on Flat Planes

Area of Science:

• Soft Matter Physics
• Computational Chemistry
• Materials Science

Background:

• Understanding the self-assembly of particles is crucial for designing novel materials.
• Patchy particles offer tunable interactions for controlled assembly.
• Previous studies explored various patchy particle models and their assembly behaviors.

Purpose of the Study:

• To investigate the two-dimensional self-assembly of spherical one-patch particles.
• To determine the influence of interaction length and patch area on cluster formation.
• To characterize the resulting cluster shapes and structures.

Main Methods:

• Isothermal-isochoric Monte Carlo simulations were employed.
• The Kern-Frenkel (KF) potential was used to model interactions between one-patch particles.
• Simulations explored varying interaction lengths and patch areas.

Main Results:

• Increasing patch area led to a transition in dominant cluster shapes: dimers, triangular trimers, square tetramers, chain-like clusters, and island-like clusters with a square lattice.
• With a longer interaction length, diverse polygonal clusters formed, including different tetramers, pentamers, hexamers, and heptamers.
• The study systematically mapped the phase space of self-assembled structures based on particle properties.

Conclusions:

• The geometry of self-assembled structures is highly sensitive to interaction parameters like patch area and length.
• One-patch particles can form a rich variety of 2D cluster shapes, offering potential for complex material design.
• Simulation results provide a fundamental understanding of patchy particle assembly relevant to materials science.