Polar Colloidal Polymer on-the-go: from Aligning to Sliding

We integrate anisotropic interactions and directional mobility into Janus colloids, which directed their non-equilibrium hierarchical assembly. The first-order assembly relies on the anisotropic attraction between single particles, polymerizing them into reversible head-to-tail chains. The second-order assembly proceeds as a result of the “on-the-go” interaction paradigm between moving polar chains, in which the direction of motion largely determines the fates of interacting chains (growth, fragmentation and ring closure). Depending on the moving directions, chains with strong head-repulsion are prone to alignment and fragmentation, whereas chains with tail-repulsion tend to grow while sliding on each other. Large-scale structure of many interacting chains is determined by the dynamic interaction paradigm as well as the particle concentration.