Self-Assembly of Monodispersed Spherical Colloids into Complex Aggregates with Well-Defined Sizes, Shapes, and Structures

The self-assembly of polystyrene beads into a variety of polygonal and polyhedral clusters is reported. The Figure shows a schematic illustration of the procedure used to form these well-defined clusters under physical confinement. These aggregates will be useful as new types of building blocks in hierarchical self-assembly to generate mesostructured, 3D systems of high complexity.