skip to main content
OSTI.GOV title logo U.S. Department of Energy
Office of Scientific and Technical Information

Title: Spontaneous liquid crystal and ferromagnetic ordering of colloidal magnetic nanoplates

Journal Article · · Nature Communications
DOI:https://doi.org/10.1038/ncomms10394· OSTI ID:1255545
 [1];  [1];  [1];  [1];  [1];  [2];  [3];  [4];  [4];  [5];  [1];  [1];  [1]
  1. Univ. of Colorado, Boulder, CO (United States)
  2. Lawrence Berkeley National Lab. (LBNL), Berkeley, CA (United States). Advanced Light Source (ALS)
  3. Case Western Reserve Univ., Cleveland, OH (United States)
  4. Jozef Stefan Inst. (IJS), Ljubljana (Slovenia)
  5. Jozef Stefan Inst. (IJS), Ljubljana (Slovenia); Univ. of Ljubljana, Ljubljana (Slovenia)

Ferrofluids are familiar as colloidal suspensions of ferromagnetic nanoparticles in aqueous or organic solvents. The dispersed particles are randomly oriented but their moments become aligned if a magnetic field is applied, producing a variety of exotic and useful magnetomechanical effects. A longstanding interest and challenge has been to make such suspensions macroscopically ferromagnetic, that is having uniform magnetic alignment in the absence of a field. Here we report a fluid suspension of magnetic nanoplates that spontaneously aligns into an equilibrium nematic liquid crystal phase that is also macroscopically ferromagnetic. We find Its zero-field magnetization produces distinctive magnetic self-interaction effects, including liquid crystal textures of fluid block domains arranged in closed flux loops, and makes this phase highly sensitive, with it dramatically changing shape even in the Earth’s magnetic field.

Research Organization:
Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL), Berkeley, CA (United States)
Sponsoring Organization:
USDOE Office of Science (SC), Basic Energy Sciences (BES)
Grant/Contract Number:
AC02-05CH11231; DMR-0820579; DMR-1420736
OSTI ID:
1255545
Journal Information:
Nature Communications, Vol. 7; ISSN 2041-1723
Publisher:
Nature Publishing GroupCopyright Statement
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English
Citation Metrics:
Cited by: 77 works
Citation information provided by
Web of Science

References (35)

Influence of particle shape on the nematic—isotropic transition of colloidal platelet systems journal July 1999
Effect of high spontaneous polarization on defect structures and orientational dynamics of tilted chiral smectic freely suspended films journal February 2005
Dynamics and stability of ferrofluids: surface interactions journal October 1969
Chemical Substitution—An Alternative Strategy for Controlling the Particle Size of Barium Ferrite journal October 2012
Isotropic-Nematic Interface and Wetting in Suspensions of Colloidal Platelets journal August 2006
Physical Theory of Ferromagnetic Domains journal August 1950
The interfacial stability of a ferromagnetic fluid journal December 1967
Ferroelectric Nematic Liquid Crystals: Realizability and Molecular Constraints journal May 1988
Magnetic Properties of Colloidal Suspensions of Interacting Magnetic Particles journal July 2005
Ferronematics journal June 1970
Molecular dynamics study on the equilibrium magnetization properties and structure of ferrofluids journal August 2002
Ferromagnetic ferrofluids journal December 2013
Salt-Induced Ordering in Lamellar Colloids journal March 2002
Nematic–isotropic transition in polydisperse systems of infinitely thin hard platelets journal April 1999
Theory of magnetic suspensions in liquid crystals journal January 1970
Dipolar and Quadrupolar Ordering in S = 3 2 Ising Systems journal February 1972
New Trends in Colloidal Liquid Crystals Based on Mineral Moieties journal January 2000
Behavior of a magnetic fluid microdrop in a rotating magnetic field journal April 1994
Physical Theory of Ferromagnetic Domains journal October 1949
Monte Carlo Study of the Isotropic-Nematic Transition in a Fluid of Thin Hard Disks journal October 1982
Chain aggregate structure and magnetic birefringence in polydisperse ferrofluids journal August 2004
Elastic constants of hard thick platelets by Monte Carlo simulation and virial expansion journal January 2011
Entropic Wetting and the Free Isotropic−Nematic Interface of Hard Colloidal Platelets journal July 2007
Liquid-crystalline aqueous clay suspensions journal October 2006
Isotropic-Nematic Phase Transition in Liquid Crystals journal August 1970
The Effects of Shape on the Interaction of Colloidal Particles journal May 1949
Liquid crystal phase transitions in suspensions of polydisperse plate-like particles journal August 2000
Ferroelectric nematic liquid-crystal phases of dipolar hard ellipsoids journal November 1989
Ferromagnetism in suspensions of magnetic platelets in liquid crystal journal December 2013
Magnetic properties of colloidal suspensions of interacting magnetic particles journal August 2004
Magneto-optic and converse magnetoelectric effects in a ferromagnetic liquid crystal journal January 2014
Device Applications of Ferroelectric Liquid Crystals: Importance of Polarization Charge Interactions conference July 1989
Directed Assembly of BaFe 12 O 19 Particles and the Formation of Magnetically Oriented Films journal December 2011
Magnetic Properties of Colloidal Suspensions of Interacting Magnetic Particles journal July 2005
Simple Molecular Model for the Smectic A Phase of Liquid Crystals journal September 1971

Cited By (26)

Discrete evolution of the crystal structure during the growth of Ba-hexaferrite nanoplatelets journal January 2018
Magnetic nanoparticles in a nematic channel: A one-dimensional study journal July 2019
Ferrocholesteric–ferronematic transitions induced by shear flow and magnetic field journal November 2017
CdSe quantum dots in chiral smectic C matrix: experimental evidence of smectic layer distortion by small and wide angle X-ray scattering and subsequent effect on electro-optical parameters text January 2018
Ferromagnetic nematic liquid crystals journal January 2017
Magneto-optic dynamics in a ferromagnetic nematic liquid crystal journal January 2018
Creating two self-assembly micro-environments to achieve supercrystals with dual structures using polyhedral nanoparticles journal July 2018
From colloids in liquid crystals to colloidal liquid crystals journal August 2019
Magnetic Nanoplatelets for High Contrast Cardiovascular Imaging by Magnetically Modulated Optical Coherence Tomography journal May 2019
Calculation of exchange integrals and Curie temperature for La-substituted barium hexaferrites journal October 2016
Rotational dynamics of colloidal hexaferrite nanoplates journal September 2018
CdSe quantum dots in chiral smectic C matrix: experimental evidence of smectic layer distortion by small and wide angle X-ray scattering and subsequent effect on electro-optical parameters journal July 2018
Director reorientation dynamics of ferromagnetic nematic liquid crystals journal January 2018
CdSe quantum dots in chiral smectic C matrix: experimental evidence of smectic layer distortion by small and wide angle X-ray scattering and subsequent effect on electro-optical parameters text January 2018
Evolution of nematic and ferromagnetic ordering in suspensions of magnetic nanoplatelets journal January 2019
Field-controlled structures in ferromagnetic cholesteric liquid crystals journal October 2017
Effective Landau theory of ferronematics journal August 2018
Dynamic Magneto-optic Coupling in a Ferromagnetic Nematic Liquid Crystal journal September 2017
Magnetic Nanoparticles in a Nematic Channel: A One-Dimensional Study text January 2018
Structure-Relaxivity Relationships of Magnetic Nanoparticles for Magnetic Resonance Imaging journal January 2019
Manipulation enhancement of terahertz liquid crystal phase shifter magnetically induced by ferromagnetic nanoparticles journal January 2019
A comparison between size dependent paraelectric and ferroelectric BaTiO 3 nanoparticle doped nematic and ferroelectric liquid crystals journal February 2017
Effective Landau theory of ferronematics text January 2018
Magnetic Nanoplatelets for High Contrast Cardiovascular Imaging by Magnetically Modulated Optical Coherence Tomography journal April 2019
Gold Nanoparticles Thin Films with Thermo‐ and Photoresponsive Plasmonic Properties Realized with Liquid‐Crystalline Ligands journal June 2019
Magnetic Ordering in Systems of Identical Particles with an Arbitrary Spin journal November 2019

Similar Records

Optical patterning of magnetic domains and defects in ferromagnetic liquid crystal colloids
Journal Article · Mon Aug 17 00:00:00 EDT 2015 · Applied Physics Letters · OSTI ID:1255545

Linked topological colloids in a nematic host
Journal Article · Mon Mar 30 00:00:00 EDT 2015 · Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · OSTI ID:1255545

Review: knots and other new topological effects in liquid crystals and colloids
Journal Article · Tue Sep 08 00:00:00 EDT 2020 · Reports on Progress in Physics · OSTI ID:1255545