Published November 29, 2019 | Version v1
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Sculpted grain boundaries in soft crystals

  • 1. University of Chicago
  • 2. Universidad Autónoma de San Luis Potosí
  • 3. Universidad Autonóma Metropolitana
  • 4. Argonne National Laboratory

Description

Engineering the grain boundaries of crystalline materials represents an enduring challenge, particularly in the case of soft materials. Grain boundaries, however, can provide preferential sites for chemical reactions, adsorption processes, nucleation of phase transitions, and mechanical transformations. In this work, "soft heteroepitaxy" is used to exert precise control over the lattice orientation of three-dimensional liquid crystalline soft crystals, thereby granting the ability to sculpt the grain boundaries between them. Since these soft crystals are liquid-like in nature, the heteroepitaxy approach introduced here provides a clear strategy to accurately mold liquid-liquid interfaces in structured liquids with a hitherto unavailable level of precision.

Data availability

All data needed to evaluate the conclusions in the paper are present in the paper and/or the Supplementary Materials. Additional data related to this paper may be requested from the authors.

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Additional details

Identifiers

DOI
10.1126/sciadv.aax9112
Other
oai:uchicago.tind.io:10982

Funding

U.S. Department of Energy

UChicago Information

Division(s)
Pritzker School of Molecular Engineering