Manipulating colloidal crystallization for photonic applications

Alfons van Blaaderen, Jacob Hoogenboom, Anand Yethiraj

Condensed Matter dept., Debye Inst., Utrecht University, P.O. Box 80000, 3508 TA Utrecht, FOM Inst. for Atomic and Molecular Physics, Kruislaan 407, 1098 SJ Amsterdam, The Netherlands

Colloidal particles are the ideal building blocks for photonic crystals because their properties can be tuned by chemical modification [1] and their self-organization or crystallization into 3D periodic lattices can be manipulated by changing the interaction potentials between the particles and by using external fields. In this contribution we focus 1) on how large colloidal crystals with known crystal orientation and symmetry can be grown by colloidal epitaxy [2]. And 2) how colloidal crystallization can be manipulated by electric fields; both in symmetry, size and orientation of the crystals [3].

1) A. van Blaaderen, MRS Bulletin, 23, 39 (1998)

2) A. van Blaaderen, R. Ruel, P. Wiltzius, Nature, 385, 321 (1997)

3) U. Dassanayake, S. Fraden, A. van Blaaderen, J. Chem. Phys., 112, 3851 (2000)