Surface-inactive, highly hydrophilic particles are utilized to effectively and reversibly stabilize oil-in-water emulsions. This is a result of attractive van der Waals forces between particles and oil droplets in water, which are sufficient to trap the particles in close proximity to oil–water interfaces when repulsive forces between particles and oil droplets are suppressed. The emulsifying efficiency of the highly hydrophilic particles is determined by van der Waals attraction between particle monolayer shells and oil droplets enclosed therein and is inversely proportional to the particle size, while their stabilizing efficiency is determined by van der Waals attraction between single particles and oil droplets, which is proportional to the particle size. This differentiation in mechanism between emulsification and stabilization will significantly advance our knowledge of emulsions, thus enabling better control and design of emulsion-based technologies in practice.

We report measurements and theoretical predictions on the effect of an aligning magnetic field on the orientational disorder of a nematic liquid crystal in contact with isotropic solid substrates. Different types of substrates present a similar disorder and a similar dependency on the magnetic field amplitude, i.e. a decreasing of the angular distribution widths and spatial correlation lengths. Measurements are in qualitative agreement with a theory where the orientational disorder emerges from the competition between the aligning magnetic torque and the disorienting thermal fluctuations during the adsorption of the liquid crystal molecules on the substrate.

Light transmission through wheat (T. aestivum L.) grain longitudinal cross sections of different thickness was used to study the endosperm microstructure and was shown to strictly follow a Beer-Lambert law allowing a non ambiguous quantification of the endosperm vitreousness. Therefore similar samples obtained from near-isogenic lines differing by hardness and grown in two distinct environments affecting their vitreousness were analyzed and confirmed the relationship between light transmission and the endosperm microstructure. In each sample, moreover analysis of light transmission within the different grain parts highlighted the greater compactness of the central endosperm cheeks in comparison with the distal and the proximal regions. These results helps a better understanding of the endosperm microstructure.

Material failure is ubiquitous, with implications from geology to everyday life and material science. It often involves sudden, unpredictable events, with little or no macroscopically detectable precursors. A deeper understanding of the microscopic mechanisms eventually leading to failure is clearly required, but experiments remain scarce. Here, we show that the microscopic dynamics of a colloidal gel, a model network-forming system, exhibit dramatic changes that precede its macroscopic failure by thousands of seconds. Using an original setup coupling light scattering and rheology, we simultaneously measure the macroscopic deformation and the microscopic dynamics of the gel, while applying a constant shear stress. We show that the network failure is preceded by qualitative and quantitative changes of the dynamics, from reversible particle displacements to a burst of irreversible plastic rearrangements.

Control of film structures made from a polystyrene-polystyrene sodium sulfonate-polystyrene (PS-PNaSS-PS) copolymer micellar solution is investigated in a THF/water mixture. Four different copolymers (varying molecular weights) are synthesised via RAFT (Reversible Addition Fragmentation chain Transfer) polymerisation. Depending on parameters such as copolymer molecular weight, solvent composition and copolymer concentration, the PS-PNaSS-PS triblock self-assembles into different morphologies in solution and dry state. The effect of each parameter is investigated using characterization techniques such as AFM, TEM, Cryo-TEM, SEM and SAXS. The morphologies obtained for PS-PNaSS-PS are found to be extremely sensitive when the water content of the micellar solution is low. Among the structures observed, a highly ordered nano-porous film is obtained using a PS10k-PNaSS6k-PS10k triblock copolymer solution containing 3.0 wt% of water. This micellar solution is used to prepare a porous membrane for filtration applications. Pure water filtration data suggest a pore size in the range of ultrafiltration, making these membranes attractive for applications in the food industry, for bacteria, virus and protein removal.

We use space-resolved dynamic light scattering in the highly multiple scattering regime (Photon Correlation Imaging Diffusing Wave Spectroscopy, PCI-DWS) to investigate temperature-induced phase transitions in polymorphic materials. We study paraffin wax as a simple model system and chocolate, a prototypical example of fat-based products exhibiting complex, history-dependent phase transitions. We find that microscopic dynamics measured using PCI-DWS show remarkable, non-monotonic behavior upon heating: they transiently accelerate when crossing phase transition and slow down above the transition temperature. Sub-micron resolution measurements of the local drift of the sample surface reveal that the speed-up of the dynamics is due to the strain field induced by the change in density at transition temperature. The transition temperatures obtained from PCI-DWS are found to be in excellent agreement with those inferred from complementary differential scanning calorimetry and X-ray scattering experiments, thereby validating PCI-DWS as a new, powerful tool for the characterization of phase transitions in complex soft matter. Finally, we demonstrate the unique possibilities afforded by space-resolved DWS by investigating the spatially heterogeneous response of poorly manufactured or composite chocolate samples.

We explore the glassy dynamics of soft colloids using microgels and charged particles interacting by steric and screened Coulomb interactions, respectively. In the supercooled regime, the structural relaxation time τα of both systems grows steeply with volume fraction, reminiscent of the behavior of colloidal hard spheres. Computer simulations confirm that the growth of τα on approaching the glass transition is independent of particle softness. By contrast, softness becomes relevant at very large packing fractions when the system falls out of equilibrium. In this nonequilibrium regime, τα depends surprisingly weakly on packing fraction, and time correlation functions exhibit a compressed exponential decay consistent with stress-driven relaxation. The transition to this novel regime coincides with the onset of an anomalous decrease in local order with increasing density typical of ultrasoft systems. We propose that these peculiar dynamics results from the combination of the nonequilibrium aging dynamics expected in the glassy state and the tendency of colloids interacting through soft potentials to refluidize at high packing fractions.