Generalized Janus nematic colloids based on various morphologies of particle surface patches imposing homeotropic and planar surface anchoring are demonstrated. By using mesoscopic numerical modeling, multiple types of Janus particles are explored, demonstrating a variety of novel complex colloidal structures. We also show binding of Janus particles to a fixed Janus post in the nematic cell, wh...

Liquid crystal suspensions including variousmicroand nano-colloidal particles have recently been received great attention for many practical applications such as nanosensors and devices, etc. When large colloidal particles of micronscale are dispersed in a uniform nematic liquid crystal phase, the colloidal particles disturb a long-range orientational order of the nematic phase. For a strong an...

We demonstrate solution-processed photodetectors composed of heavy-metal-free Si nano/micro particle composite. The colloidal Si particles are synthesized by electrochemical etching of Si wafers, followed by ultra-sonication to pulverize the porous surface. With alkyl ligand surface passivation through hydrosilylation reaction, the particles can form a stable colloidal suspension which exhibits...

The synthesis of polymer brush decorated silica nano-particles is demonstrated by activator regeneration by electron transfer atom transfer radical polymerization (ARGET ATRP) grafting of poly(tert-butyl methacrylate). ATRP initiator decorated silica nano-particles were obtained using a novel trimethylsiloxane derivatised ATRP initiator obtained by click chemistry. Comparison of de-grafted poly...

Nonspherical colloids and their ordered arrays may be more attractive in applications such as photonic crystals than their spherical counterparts because of their lower symmetries, although such structures are difficult to achieve. In this letter, we describe the fabrication and characterization of colloidal crystals constructed from nonspherical polyhedrons. We fabricated such nonspherical col...

Colloidal silica bonded refractory castables have been developed recently. It was found that colloidal silica is one of the best binders can substitute other binders such as cement in No Cement Castable (NCC) and Ultra Low Cement Castable (ULCC) refractories. Also composition of colloidal silica with appropriate additives resulted in a gel form which makes the initial strength. Moreover, the na...

We developed a method to fabricate an array of silver non-planar nano-arc-gaps via inverted hemispherical colloidal lithography and shadow metal evaporation methods. It is found that there is a localized surface plasmon mode which results in extraordinary optical transmission. The electric field is strongly localized at the nano-arc-gap region and therefore induces a resonance that has an ultra...

A well-defined test structure of organic static-induction transistor (SIT) having regularly sized nano-apertures in the gate electrode has been fabricated by colloidal lithography using 130-nm-diameter polystyrene spheres as shadow masks during vacuum deposition. Transistor characteristics of individual nano-apertures, namely ‘nano-SIT,’ have been measured using a conductive atomic-force-micros...