Low-density crystals in charged colloids : Comparison with Yukawa theory

Abstract

Charged colloids can behave as Yukawa systems, with similar phase behaviour. Using particle- resolved studies, we consider a system with an unusually long Debye screening length which forms crystals at low colloid volume fraction ϕ ~ 0.01. We quantitatively compare this system with the Yukawa model and find that its freezing point is compatible with the theoretical prediction but that the crystal polymorph is not always that expected. In particular we find body-centred cubic crystals where face-centred cubic crystals are expected.

To appear in the special issue of Contributions to Plasma Physics for Strongly Coupled Coulomb Systems 2014

References in corpus (3)

• Accurate determination of crystal structures based on averaged local bond order parameters
• In Search of Colloidal Hard Spheres
• Local structure and dynamics in colloidal fluids and gels

Cited by in corpus (4)

• Real Space Analysis of Colloidal Gels: Triumphs, Challenges and Future Directions
• Triple junction at the triple point resolved on the individual particle level
• Brownian Dynamics of Fully Confined Suspensions of Rigid Particles Without Green's Functions
• Electrostatic energy and phonon properties of Yukawa crystals