Directing and reconfiguring colloidal assembly by disclination networks in nematic liquid crystal as templates

Exotic structures with interesting physical and chemical properties can be achieved by self-organizing engineered building blocks. The central aim for self-assembly is to precisely control the position and orientation of individual building blocks. In this work, we use topological defects (disclinations) in nematic liquid crystals as templates to direct the self-assembly of colloidal particles into designable 3D structures. By photopatterning preprogrammed molecular orientations at two confining surfaces, we created pre-designable disclination networks and characterized their interactions with spherical colloidal particles. We find that colloidal particles are attracted to different disclinations depending on the orientation of the point defect (elastic dipole) around the colloids. We demonstrate that the positions, network structures, and orientation of the elastic dipoles of the colloidal chains can be pre-designed and reconfigured with remote illumination of polarized light.