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Heterogeneous pattern formation of small colloids grafted to large oil droplets using DNA

By: Erika Eiser
From: Department of Physics, University of Cambridge
At: Instituto de Investigação Interdisciplinar, Anfiteatro
[2014-11-07] 14:00

I will present very recent work on grafting DNA-functionalized hard spheres – typically 50 to 500nm in diameter – to roughly 20µm large oil droplets. We use a newly developed procedure for the DNA functionalization of these oil droplets. By playing with mixtures of DNA grafted to the surfaces of both oil droplet and differently ‘flavoured’ hard spheres we show that latter binds to the oil droplets via DNA-hybridization. Interestingly, these in bulk mutually repelling hard spheres aggregate on the oil-droplets surface forming liquid and solid rafts.