Nanoparticle Assembly:A Perspective and some Unanswered Questions

Kumar, Sanat K.; Kumaraswamy, Guruswamy; Prasad, B. L. V.; Bandyopadhyaya, Rajdip; Granick, Steve; Gang, Oleg; Manoharan, Vinothan N.; Frenkel, Daan; Kotov, Nicholas A.

doi:10.18520/cs/v112/i08/1635-1641

Cited by 14 publications

(14 citation statements)

References 63 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…Most conclusions from previous research are dependent on the analysis of the structure of assemblies by electron microscopy combined with theoretical calculations. This lacks direct evidence to illustrate some critical issues that strongly affect the self-assembly of NPs 28 , 29 . For example, the experimentally well-defined “picture”, which can precisely depict how the surface ligands interact to drive the assembly, has only been rarely achieved 10 , though the strategy of sticky ligands is widely applied to manipulate the self-assembly of NPs 30 – 32 .…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Modulating the hierarchical fibrous assembly of Au nanoparticles with atomic precision

et al. 2018

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

The ability to modulate nanoparticle (NP) assemblies with atomic precision is still lacking, which hinders us from creating hierarchical NP organizations with desired properties. In this work, a hierarchical fibrous (1D to 3D) assembly of Au NPs (21-gold atom, Au21) is realized and further modulated with atomic precision via site-specific tailoring of the surface hook (composed of four phenyl-containing ligands with a counteranion). Interestingly, tailoring of the associated counterion significantly changes the electrical transport properties of the NP-assembled solids by two orders of magnitude due to the altered configuration of the interacting π–π pairs of the surface hooks. Overall, our success in atomic-level modulation of the hierarchical NP assembly directly evidences how the NP ligands and associated counterions can function to guide the 1D, 2D, and 3D hierarchical self-assembly of NPs in a delicate manner. This work expands nanochemists’ skills in rationally programming the hierarchical NP assemblies with controllable structures and properties.

show abstract

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Modulating the hierarchical fibrous assembly of Au nanoparticles with atomic precision

et al. 2018

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…A possible consequence is aggregation. The controlled assembly of (functionalized) nanoparticles, − colloids, − or proteins enables the design of materials that have great potential in sensing, imaging, optoelectronics, synthetic biology, and medical therapy. Apart from the nature of the building blocks, the formation of aggregates depends on the strength of the attractive forces between them and may involve transient states.…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

Formation and Growth of Mesoglobules in Aqueous Poly(N-isopropylacrylamide) Solutions Revealed with Kinetic Small-Angle Neutron Scattering and Fast Pressure Jumps

et al. 2018

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

The phase transition from swollen chains to polymer mesoglobules of an aqueous solution of poly(N-isopropylacrylamide) is investigated with kinetic small-angle neutron scattering with 50 ms time resolution in conjunction with millisecond pressure jumps across the coexistence line. The time-resolved study evidenced three distinct regimes: fractal clusters form during the first second and transform into compact mesoglobules. During the following ∼20 s, these grow by diffusion-limited coalescence. The final step consists of a slow growth characterized by an energy barrier of several k B T. The method opens opportunities for kinetic structural studies of multicomponent systems over wide length and time scales and gives a structural picture spanning from the chain collapse to mesoscopic phase separation.

show abstract

“…For instance, Douglas et al employed molecular dynamics simulation to investigate the structure that polymer-grafted nanoparticles (NPs) formed in the solvent-free condition, and Sabouri et al employed silica NPs as an inorganic core and poly(methyl methacrylate) (PMMA) as an organic shell to form two-dimensional arrays in a colloidal crystal. Recently, many investigations have focused on the surface functionalization of the NPs with small molecules such as ligands − or DNA. − Nonetheless, such a multicomponent system is unable to obtain the excellent mechanical properties with a well-defined order of NPs. On the contrary, employing one-component polymer-grafted NPs (OPNPs) is an effective approach to assemble to form the superlattice structure because it may contain much greater loading of NPs. , For instance, Goel et al investigated systems consisting of silica NPs grafted with dense poly( n -butyl acrylate) brushes with high density and analyzed the rule of the distance between particles and the end-to-end distance of polymer, which was helpful to predict the structure that polymer-grafted NPs tend to self-assemble.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Designing Superlattice Structure via Self-Assembly of One-Component Polymer-Grafted Nanoparticles

et al. 2019

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

The control of the self-assembly of the nanocrystals into ordered structures has been extensively investigated, but fewer efforts have been devoted to studying one-component polymer-grafted nanoparticles (OPNPs). Herein, through coarse-grained molecular dynamics simulation, we design a novel nanoparticle (NP) grafted with polymer chains, focusing on its self-assembled structures. First, we examine the effects of length and density of grafted polymer chains by calculating the radial distribution function between NPs, as well as through direct visualization. We observe a monotonic change of the arranged morphology of grafted-NPs as a function of the density of grafted polymer chains, which indicates that the increase of the grafting density contributes to the order of the morphology. Meanwhile, we find that much longer grafted polymer chains worsen the regularity of the morphology. Then, we probe the influence of the stiffness of grafted polymer chains (denoted by K ranging from 0 to 500) on the order of grafted-NPs, finding that the order of the structure exhibits a nonmonotonic behavior as a function of K at moderate grafting density. For high grafting density, the order of the morphology is initially enhanced and becomes saturated as a function of K. For the effect of K on the stress–strain behavior, the system with the lowest order demonstrates the most remarkable reinforced mechanical behavior for both low and high grafting density. Last, we establish the phase diagram by varying the stiffness and density of the grafted polymer chains, which contains the amorphous, ordered, and superlattice structures, respectively. In general, our simulated results provide guidelines to tailor the self-assembly of the OPNPs by taking advantage of the length, density, and stiffness of grafted polymer chains.

show abstract

Nanoparticle Assembly:A Perspective and some Unanswered Questions

Cited by 14 publications

References 63 publications

Modulating the hierarchical fibrous assembly of Au nanoparticles with atomic precision

Modulating the hierarchical fibrous assembly of Au nanoparticles with atomic precision

Formation and Growth of Mesoglobules in Aqueous Poly(N-isopropylacrylamide) Solutions Revealed with Kinetic Small-Angle Neutron Scattering and Fast Pressure Jumps

Designing Superlattice Structure via Self-Assembly of One-Component Polymer-Grafted Nanoparticles

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About