Institute of Physical Chemistry, RWTH Aachen University, 52056 Aachen, Germany.
Nano Lett. 2022 Mar 23;22(6):2412-2418. doi: 10.1021/acs.nanolett.2c00120. Epub 2022 Mar 8.
Particle size disparities suppress crystallization. However, soft deformable nanogels can change the size of the larger particles in suspension and crystallize even at a high initial size-polydispersity. Using neutron scattering with contrast variation, the response of individual nanogels in crowded environments was probed, and an increase of the parameter describing size-polydispersity was found, which is often interpreted as deformation. Here, computer simulations are used to generate deformed nanogels and the corresponding form factor. The data are fitted with the spherical model used to analyze scattering data. The fits show the same qualitative increase of the parameter related to the size-polydispersity with increasing particle deformation. Starting from the simulated deformed spheres, we also reproduce experimental scattering data. A further analysis of the particle shows that the size disparities between nanogels do not increase significantly. In contrast, their shapes strongly vary from one nanogel to the other.
颗粒尺寸差异抑制结晶。然而，柔软可变形的纳米凝胶可以改变悬浮液中大颗粒的尺寸，即使在初始尺寸多分散性较高的情况下也可以结晶。使用具有对比变化的中子散射，探测了拥挤环境中单个纳米凝胶的响应，并发现描述尺寸多分散性的参数增加，这通常被解释为变形。在这里，使用计算机模拟生成变形纳米凝胶及其相应的形状因子。使用用于分析散射数据的球形模型对数据进行拟合。拟合结果表明，随着颗粒变形的增加，与尺寸多分散性相关的参数呈相同的定性增加。从模拟变形球体开始，我们还再现了实验散射数据。对颗粒的进一步分析表明，纳米凝胶之间的尺寸差异没有显著增加。相比之下，它们的形状在一个纳米凝胶到另一个纳米凝胶之间有很大的变化。
