We are very excited about two new nanoparticle publications in top-level journals, a review article on self-assembly in Chemical Reviews and an upcoming paper about quasicrystals in Nature Materials:

“Chemical methods developed over the past two decades enable preparation of colloidal nanocrystals with uniform size and shape. These Brownian objects readily order into superlattices. Recently, the range of accessible inorganic cores and tunable surface chemistries dramatically increased, expanding the set of nanocrystal arrangements experimentally attainable. In this review, we discuss efforts to create next-generation materials via bottom-up organization of nanocrystals with preprogrammed functionality and self-assembly instructions. […]”

Self-Assembly of Colloidal Nanocrystals: From Intricate Structures to Functional Materials
M.A. Boles, M. Engel, D.V. Talapin
Chemical Reviews 116, 11220-11289 (2016)

“Expanding the library of self-assembled superstructures provides insight into the behaviour of atomic crystals and supports the development of materials with mesoscale order. Here we build on recent findings of soft matter quasicrystals and report a quasicrystalline binary nanocrystal superlattice that exhibits correlations in the form of partial matching rules reducing tiling disorder. We determine a three-dimensional structure model through electron tomography and direct imaging of surface topography. […]”

Quasicrystalline Nanocrystal Superlattice with Partial Matching Rules
X. Ye, J. Chen, M.E. Irrgang, M. Engel, A. Dong, S.C. Glotzer, C.B. Murray
Nature Materials, in press (2016)

Starting in the fall semester 2016/2017, Michael Engel will be MAP Focal Subject Chair for “Computational Materials Science and Process Simulation”. MAP is short for “Advanced Materials and Processes”, an international elite Master’s program funded by the Elitenetzwerk Bayern at the intersection of Materials Science and Chemical Engineering. Interested students can apply here.

Michael Engel made a trip to to USA with a research stay at the University of Michigan, a visit of the Talpin group with seminar at the University of Chicago, and a joint workshop of the University of Minnesota and the Friedrich-Alexander University Erlangen-Nürnberg in Minneapolis.

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“We study photonic band gap formation in two-dimensional high-refractive-index disordered materials where the dielectric structure is derived from packing disks in real and reciprocal space. Numerical calculations of the photonic density of states demonstrate the presence of a band gap for all polarizations in both cases. We find that the band gap width is controlled by the increase in positional correlation inducing short-range order and hyperuniformity concurrently. Our findings suggest that the optimization of short-range order, in particular the tailoring of Bragg scattering at the isotropic Brillouin zone, are of key importance for designing disordered PBG materials.”

Role of Short-Range Order and Hyperuniformity in the Formation of Band Gaps in Disordered Photonic Materials
L.S. Froufe-Perez, M. Engel, P.F. Damasceno, N. Muller, J. Haberko, S.C. Glotzer, F. Scheffold
Physical Review Letters 117, 053902 (2016)