Local melting attracts grain boundaries in colloidal polycrystals

Abstract

We find that laser-induced local melting attracts and deforms grain boundaries in 2D colloidal crystals. When a melted region in contact with the edge of a crystal grain recrystallizes, it deforms the grain boundary --- this attraction is driven by the multiplicity of deformed grain boundary configurations. Furthermore, the attraction provides a method to fabricate artificial colloidal crystal grains of arbitrary shape, enabling new experimental studies of grain boundary dynamics and ultimately hinting at a novel approach for fabricating materials with designer microstructures.

arXiv comment5 pages, 5 figures

References in corpus (2)

• Imaging Grains and Grain Boundaries in Single-Layer Graphene: An Atomic Patchwork Quilt
• Restricted Dislocation Motion in Crystals of Colloidal Dimer Particles

Cited by in corpus (6)

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• Stabilization and self-passivation of symmetrical grain boundaries by mirror symmetry breaking
• Grain splitting is a mechanism for grain coarsening in colloidal polycrystals
• Shape multistability in flexible tubular crystals through interactions of mobile dislocations
• Ultrafast modulation of the molten metal surface tension under femtosecond laser irradiation
• Probing the Local Response of Glass-forming Liquids by Laser Excitations