Diffusion of point defects in two-dimensional colloidal crystals

Uniform colloidal microspheres dispersed in a solvent will, under appropriate conditions, self-assemble into ordered crystalline structures1. Using these colloidal crystals as a model system, a great variety of problems of interest to materials science, physical chemistry, and condensed-matter physics have been investigated during the past two decades. Recently, it has been demonstrated2 that point defects can be created in two-dimensional colloidal crystals3 by manipulating individual particles with optical tweezers. Direct imaging of these defects verified that their stable configurations have lower symmetry than the underlying triangular lattice, as predicted by numerical simulations for a number of two-dimensional systems4,5,6,7. It was also observed that point defects can dissociate into pairs of well-separated dislocations, a topological excitation especially important in two dimensions. Here we use a similar experimental system to study the dynamics of mono- and di-vacancies in two-dimensional colloidal crystals. We see evidence that the excitation of point defects into dislocation pairs enhances the diffusion of di-vacancies. Moreover, the hopping of the defects does not follow a pure random walk, but exhibits surprising memory effects. We expect the results presented in this work to be relevant for explaining the dynamics of other two-dimensional systems.