%0 Journal Article %J Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences %D 2021 %T Microscopic origins of the crystallographically preferred growth in evaporation-induced colloidal crystals %A Li, Ling %A Goodrich, Carl %A Yang, Haizhao %A Phillips, Katherine R %A Jia, Zian %A Chen, Hongshun %A Wang, Lifeng %A Zhang, Jinjin %A Liu, Anhua %A Lu, Jianfeng %A Shuai, Jianwei %A Brenner, Michael %A Spaepen, Frans %A Aizenberg, Joanna %X

Self-assembly is one of the central themes in biologically controlled synthesis, and it also plays a pivotal role in fabricating a variety of advanced engineering materials. In particular, evaporation-induced self-assembly of colloidal particles enables versatile fabrication of highly ordered two- or three-dimensional nanostructures for optical, sensing, catalytic, and other applications. While it is well known that this process results in the formation of the face-centered cubic (fcc) lattice with the close-packed {111} plane parallel to the substrate, the crystallographic texture development of colloidal crystals is less understood. In this study, we show that the preferred <110> growth in the fcc colloidal crystals synthesized through evaporation-induced assembly is achieved through a gradual crystallographic rotation facilitated by mechanical stress-induced geometrically necessary dislocations.

%B Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences %V 118 %P e2107588118 %G eng %U https://www.pnas.org/content/118/32/e2107588118.short %N 32