An Implicit-Solvent Model for the Interfacial Configuration of Colloidal Nanoparticles and Application to the Self-Assembly of Truncated Cubes.

This study outlines the development of an implicit-solvent model that reproduces the behavior of colloidal nanoparticles at a fluid-fluid interface. The center point of this formulation is the generalized quaternion-based orientational constraint (QOCO) method. The model captures three major energetic characteristics that define the nanoparticle configuration-position (orthogonal to the interfacial plane), orientation, and inter-nanoparticle interaction. The framework encodes physically relevant parameters that provide an intuitive means to simulate a broad spectrum of interfacial conditions. Results show that for a wide range of shapes, our model is able to replicate the behavior of an isolated nanoparticle at an explicit fluid-fluid interface, both qualitatively and often nearly quantitatively. Furthermore, the family of truncated cubes is used as a test bed to analyze the effect of changes in the degree of truncation on the potential-of-mean-force landscape. Finally, our results for the self-assembly of an array of cuboctahedra provide corroboration to the experimentally observed honeycomb and square lattices.