title: Coassembly of nanorods and nanospheres in suspensions and in stratified films.
abstract: The entropically driven coassembly of nanorods (cellulose nanocrystals, CNCs) and nanospheres (dye-labeled spherical latex nanoparticles, NPs) was studied in aqueous suspensions and in solid films. In mixed CNC-latex suspensions, phase separation into an isotropic latex-NP-rich and a chiral nematic CNC-rich phase took place; the latter contained a significant amount of latex NPs. Drying the mixed suspension resulted in CNC-latex films with planar disordered layers of latex NPs, which alternated with chiral nematic CNC-rich regions. In addition, fluorescent latex NPs were embedded in the chiral nematic domains. The stratified morphology of the films, together with a random distribution of latex NPs in the anisotropic phase, led to the films having close-to-uniform fluorescence, birefringence, and circular dichroism properties.
authors.affiliation: Department of Chemistry, University of Toronto, 80 St. George Street, Toronto, M5S 3H6 (Canada).
authors.forename: Héloïse
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Thérien-Aubin
authors.forename: Ariella
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Lukach
authors.forename: Natalie
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Pitch
authors.forename: Eugenia
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Kumacheva
mesh_terms: D002482:Cellulose / Q000737:chemistry*; D004396:Coloring Agents / Q000737:chemistry*; D054118:Nanospheres / Q000737:chemistry*; D043942:Nanotubes / Q000737:chemistry*; D010316:Particle Size; D013499:Surface Properties; D013535:Suspensions / Q000737:chemistry; D014867:Water / Q000737:chemistry
chemical_list: D004396:Coloring Agents; D013535:Suspensions; D014867:Water; D002482:Cellulose
keywords: cellulose nanocrystals; chiral films; nanoparticles; self-assembly