Phase behaviour of colloidal molecules with anisotropic interactions

In this thesis we study the self-assembly of colloidal particles with anisotropic shape in order to open novel routes to nanomaterial fabrication. We show how by changing the particle shape and the particle-particle interaction different useful microstructures can be formed, sometimes n the low density, some other times in the high density regime.

Specifically, in the different chapters of this thesis we show that

1. By employing dumbbell-shaped particles with one attractive end, it is possible to fabricate colloidal micelles, vesicles, and bilayers.

2-3. By using trimers with shape similar to a slice of pizza, and which attract other trimers near the main corner, it is possible to form colloidal microtubesf. These microtubes are specific to a particular combination of geometry and range of the interaction, otherwise a valence controlled fluid phase separation takes place instead.

4. By employing a binary mixture of hard spheres and hard tetramers, it is possible to assemble an MgCu2 binary crystal, whose sublattices display peculiar optical properties.

5. Hard spherese and hard icosahedra form a plastic crystalline phase, with long range positional order but short range orientational order. Furthermore an AB13 crystal phase can also be formed.