2025 AIChE Annual Meeting

(68d) Janus Particles and the Many Faces of Colloids

Author

Marco Lattuada - Presenter, University of Fribourg
Janus particles emerged as a highly active research area after the concept of an object with two faces bearing different functionalities was introduced by De Gennes during his Nobel speech in 1991. This has sparked the interest of colloidal and polymer scientists in developing innovative synthesis methods to prepare colloids with anisotropic shapes and directional interactions, moving beyond the concept of spherical colloids as large-scale models for atoms and viewing them as large-scale models of molecules. Such particles are promising candidates for constructing complex materials, for drug delivery, and as stabilizers for Pickering Emulsions, among other applications. One of the main challenges is the synthesis of such objects by precisely controlling the number of functionalities and their overall shape. In this talk, I would like to discuss the numerous challenges that colloidal scientists have faced in preparing particles with more than one “face”. This journey, which for me started with my postdoctoral experience in Alan Hatton’s group, is far from being over and has led to numerous and exciting scientific endeavors.