SignificanceColloidal suspensions of electrically charged nanometric sheets (nanosheets), like graphene oxide or clays, which are widely used in industry, form liquid-crystalline phases. These include the nematic phase, where all nanosheets are approximately parallel, and the lamellar phase, where they also form equidistant layers. When the particle diameter is large (100 nm to 1 µm), distinguishing these phases is quite challenging. Using newly available synchrotron small-angle X-ray scattering setups, we unambiguously identified both phases, in H3Sb3P2O14 nanosheet suspensions, by analyzing their X-ray scattering patterns. The lamellar domain size reaches 20 µm, which means each layer is made of ∼1,000 nanosheets. Because the lamellar phase was rarely predicted in suspensions of charged disks, these systems should be revisited by theory or simulations.
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