title: Confined self-assembly of cellulose nanocrystals in a shrinking droplet.
abstract: We have studied how cellulose nanocrystals (CNC) self-assemble into liquid crystalline phases in shrinking, isolated droplets. By adjusting the water dissolution rate of an aqueous CNC droplet immersed in a binary toluene-ethanol mixture we can control the final morphology of the consolidated microbead. At low ethanol concentration in the surrounding fluid dense microbeads of spherical morphology are produced while collapsed core-shell particles are obtained at high ethanol concentration. Polarized light microscopy was used to follow the spatial evolution and coalescence of birefringent spheroids during droplet shrinkage. Electron microscopy reveals the resultant nematic microstructure. This method of confined CNC assembly provides thus the possibility to prepare ordered microbeads, which can be useful as templates or for their optical properties.
authors.affiliation: Department of Mechanical Engineering, University of Melbourne, Parkville, VIC 3010, Australia.
authors.forename: Fernando
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Jativa
authors.forename: Christina
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Schütz
authors.forename: Lennart
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Bergström
authors.forename: Xuehua
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: Zhang
authors.forename: Bernd
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Wicklein
mesh_terms: D002482:Cellulose / Q000737:chemistry*; D050866:Liquid Crystals / Q000737:chemistry; D008863:Microspheres; D053758:Nanoparticles / Q000737:chemistry*; D013499:Surface Properties; D014867:Water / Q000737:chemistry
chemical_list: D014867:Water; D002482:Cellulose