Monday, 25 June 2007
Clayton 101A
181

Like-charge interactions in membrane-coated colloidal monolayers

Esther W. Gomez, University of California, Berkeley, CA, Nathan G. Clack, University of California, Berkeley, CA, and Jay T. Groves, University of California, Berkeley, CA.

Colloidal particles, near a like charged wall, have been observed to exhibit a long-range attraction under certain circumstances. The observed attraction in these systems contradicts the Poisson-Boltzmann mean field theory, which predicts that similarly charged particles will repel each other. Here, we study an electrostatically levitated two dimensional colloid in which the underlying planar surface and the particles are coated with lipid membranes. This coating allows for the surface potential of the underlying substrate and particles to be varied continuously. By exploring a wide range of surface compositions and solution ionic strengths we find that anomalous long-range like charge attraction only occurs between negatively charged particles.