Programmable Anisotropy and Percolation in Supramolecular Patchy Particle Gels
Name
GHM310.pdf
Description
Accepted version
Size
2.61 MB
Format
Adobe PDF
Checksum (MD5)
ec7597b11f02a81f52bc412e6d015a0e
Author(s)
Song, Jake
Rizvi, Mehedi H
Lynch, Brian B
Ilavsky, Jan
Mankus, David
Tracy, Joseph B
McKinley, Gareth H
Holten-Andersen, Niels
Date Issued
2020
Journal
ACS Nano
Publisher
American Chemical Society (ACS)
Citation
Song, Jake, Rizvi, Mehedi H, Lynch, Brian B, Ilavsky, Jan, Mankus, David et al. 2020. "Programmable Anisotropy and Percolation in Supramolecular Patchy Particle Gels." ACS Nano, 14 (12).
Version
Author's final manuscript
Abstract
© Patchy particle interactions are predicted to facilitate the controlled self-assembly and arrest of particles into phase-stable and morphologically tunable "equilibrium"gels, which avoids the arrested phase separation and subsequent aging that is typically observed in traditional particle gels with isotropic interactions. Despite these promising traits of patchy particle interactions, such tunable equilibrium gels have yet to be realized in the laboratory due to experimental limitations associated with synthesizing patchy particles in high yield. Here, we introduce a supramolecular metal-coordination platform consisting of metallic nanoparticles linked by telechelic polymer chains, which validates the predictions associated with patchy particle interactions and facilitates the design of equilibrium particle hydrogels through limited valency interactions. We demonstrate that the interaction valency and self-assembly of the particles can be effectively controlled by adjusting the relative concentration of polymeric linkers to nanoparticles, which enables the gelation of patchy particle hydrogels with programmable local anisotropy, morphology, and low mechanical percolation thresholds. Moreover, by crowding the local environment around the patchy particles with competing interactions, we introduce an independent method to control the self-assembly of the nanoparticles, thereby enabling the design of highly anisotropic particle hydrogels with substantially reduced percolation thresholds. We thus establish a canonical platform that facilitates multifaceted control of the self-assembly of the patchy nanoparticles en route to the design of patchy particle gels with tunable valencies, morphologies, and percolation thresholds. These advances lay important foundations for further fundamental studies of patchy particle systems and for designing tunable gel materials that address a wide range of engineering applications.
MIT Department
Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Mechanical Engineering
Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Materials Science and Engineering
Koch Institute for Integrative Cancer Research at MIT
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Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike
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DOI of Published Version
https://doi.org/10.1021/ACSNANO.0C06389
