Another look at the melting temperature of colloidal crystals in the completely deionized suspension.

Melting temperature ( T) of colloidal crystals of monodispersed polystyrene and silica spheres has been measured for the completely deionized suspensions as a function of sphere concentration. More than 3 weeks are needed before achievement of the completely deionized state. Tincreases substantially as the deionization process of the suspension proceeds. The most reliable values of Tobserved for the completely deionized suspensions are successfully analyzed again with the theory of Williams et al. The new Tvalues are compared also with the theory of Robbins et al., which treats the repulsive Yukawa potential between colloidal spheres. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]