Modeling and Design of Drying-Induced Self-Assembly of Colloidal Particles

Materials made by drying colloidal suspensions into solid structures have numerous uses — ranging from household products such as latex paints to advanced materials for catalysis, adsorption, and photonics—but the nonequilibrium process by which they form is complex and incompletely understood. I will first overview our uses of multiscale modeling, including both particle-based simulations and continuum theory, to more accurately describe drying particle suspensions. I will then discuss a surrogate-modeling framework we have developed to codesign particles and processing conditions to assemble targeted dried structures. Taken together, this work makes progress toward a multiscale framework for engineering new colloidal materials.