Papers · Preprints · Perspectives
Publications
Research from our group and earlier work. Browse by year, search by title or author, or explore selected papers.
Showing 80 publications
2026
Spatiotemporally correlated activity regulation of random-organizing hyperuniform states
Yuhan Peng#, Yusheng Lei#, and Ran Ni*. submitted (2026)
Geometry-encoded hexapods enable diverse colloidal superstructures
Yue Chen#, Xuan Feng#, Yan Wang, Lijun Hu, Ran Ni*, and Xuejun Wu*. submitted (2026)
Metastable hyperuniformity at discontinuous absorbing transitions
Yusheng Lei, and Ran Ni*. submitted (2026)
Entropy-driven physical amplification in multivalent biosensing
Yuhan Peng#, Xiuyang Xia#*, and Ran Ni*. Adv. Sci., in press (2026)
A universal scaling law for active diffusion in complex media
Qun Zhang, Yuxin Tian, Xue Zhang, Xiaoting Yu, Hongwei Zhu, Ning Zheng*, Luhui Ning*, Ran Ni*, Mingcheng Yang*, and Peng Liu*. Nature Communications, 17, 7030 (2026)
2025
U-Net 3+ for Anomalous Diffusion Analysis enhanced with Mixture Estimates (U-AnD-ME) in particle-tracking data
Solomon Asghar, Ran Ni, and Giorgio Volpe. J. Phys.: Photonics, 7, 045005 (2025)
Quantitative evaluation of methods to analyze motion changes in single-particle experiments
Gorka Munoz-Gil, Harshith Bachimanchi, Jesus Pineda, Benjamin Midtvedt, Gabriel Fernandez-Fernandez, Borja Requena, Yusef Ahsini, Solomon Asghar, Jaeyong Bae, Francisco J. Barrantes, Steen W. B. Bender, Clement Cabriel, J. Alberto Conejero, Marc Escoto, Xiaochen Feng, Rasched Haidari, Nikos S. Hatzakis, Zihan Huang, Ignacio Izeddin, Yuan Jiang, Jacob Kastel-Hansen, Judith Mine-Hattab, Ran Ni, Junwoo Park, Xiang Qu, Lucas A. Saavedra, Hao Sha, Nataliya Sokolovska, Yongbing Zhang, Giorgio Volpe, Maciej Lewenstein, Ralf Metzler, Diego Krapf, Giovanni Volpe and Carlo Manzo. Nature Communications, 16, 6749 (2025)
Designed self-assembly of programmable colloidal atom-electron equivalents
Xiuyang Xia#, Yuhan Peng#, Ka Ki Li, and Ran Ni*. Rep. Prog. Phys., 88, 078101 (2025)
Curvature-guided depletion stabilizes Kagome superlattices of nanocrystals
Siyu Wan#, Xiuyang Xia#, Yutong Gao, Heyang Zhang, Zhebin Zhang, Fangyue Xu, Dong Yang, Tongtao Li*, Jianfeng Li*, Ran Ni*, and Angang Dong*. Science, 387, 978 (2025) [Highlighted in Science]
Glass Transition in Monolayers of Rough Colloidal Ellipsoids
Jian Liang#, Xuan Feng#, Ning Zheng, Huaguang Wang*, Ran Ni* and Zexin Zhang*. Phys. Rev. Lett., 134, 038202 (2025) [Highlighted as the Editors' Suggestion, featured in Physics, and interviewed in Phys.org]
Obstacle-enhanced spontaneous oscillation of confined active granules
Xue Zhang, Yuxin Tian, Ran Ni, Luhui Ning, Peng Liu, Mingcheng Yang, and Ning Zheng. Soft Matter, 21, 819 (2025)
Non-equilibrium dynamic hyperuniform states
Yusheng Lei, and Ran Ni*. J. Phys. Condens. Matter, 37, 023004 (2025)
2024
Efficient Rare Event Sampling with Unsupervised Normalising Flows
Solomon Asghar, Qing-Xiang Pei, Giorgio Volpe* and Ran Ni*. Nature Machine Intelligence 6, 1370 (2024)
Topological programmability of isomerizable polymers
Qionghai Chen#, Xiuyang Xia#, Wanhui Huang, Liqun Zhang, Ran Ni* and Jun Liu. Phys. Rev. Lett., 133, 048101 (2024)
Guest Editorial: Preface to the special topic on active matter
Ran Ni*, Mingcheng Yang and Hepeng Zhang. National Science Open, 3, 20240027 (2024)
Macroscopic, artificial active matters
Luhui Ning, Jihua Yang, Peng Liu*, Ran Ni* and Ning Zheng*. National Science Open, 3, 20240005 (2024)
Designing superselectivity in linker-mediated multivalent nanoparticle adsorption
Xiuyang Xia and Ran Ni*. Phys. Rev. Lett., 132, 118202 (2024)
A bond swap algorithm for simulating dynamically crosslinked polymers
Peilin Rao#, Xiuyang Xia# and Ran Ni*. J. Chem. Phys., 160, 061102 (2024) [Highlighted as the Editor's Pick]
Optimal face-to-face coupling for fast self-folding kirigami
Maks Pecnik Bambic, Nuno A. M. Araujo, Benjamin J. Walker, Duncan R. Hewitt, Qing Xiang Pei, Ran Ni and Giorgio Volpe. Soft Matter, 20, 1114 (2024)
Phase reentrances and solid deformations in confined colloidal crystals
Xiaoxia Li#, Huang Fang#, Krongtum Sankaewtong#, Minhua Li, Yanshuang Chen, Jiping Huang, Ran Ni*, Hajime Tanaka* and Peng Tan*. Phys. Rev. Lett., 132, 018202 (2024)
2023
Janus Particles with Tunable Patch Symmetries and their Assembly into Chiral Colloidal Clusters
Tianran Zhang, Dengping Lyu, Wei Xu, Xuan Feng, Ran Ni*, and Yufeng Wang*. Nature Communications, 14, 8494 (2023) [Highlighted as the Editor's Highlights]
How does a hyperuniform fluid freeze?
Yusheng Lei, and Ran Ni*. Proc. Natl Acad. Sci. USA 120, e2312866120 (2023)
Random organization and non-equilibrium hyperuniform fluids on a sphere
Yusheng Lei, Ning Zheng and Ran Ni*. J. Chem. Phys. 159, 081101 (2023)
Shape-directed self-assembly of photoresponsive hybrid colloids
Haiyang Zhang#, Xuan Feng#, Xiuyang Xia, Jiao Zhu, Huaguang Wang, Ran Ni*, and Zexin Zhang*. Small Methods, 2300383 (2023)
The role of receptor uniformity in multivalent binding
Xiuyang Xia, Ge Zhang, Massimo Pica Ciamarra, Yang Jiao, and Ran Ni*. JACS Au, 3, 1385 (2023)
2022
Entropy driven thermo-gelling vitrimer
Xiuyang Xia#, Peilin Rao#, Juan Yang, Massimo Pica Ciamarra, and Ran Ni*. JACS Au 2, 2359 (2022)
Duality, hidden symmetry and dynamic isomerism in 2D hinge structures
Qunli Lei, Feng Tang, Jidong Hu, Yuqiang Ma, and Ran Ni*. Phys. Rev. Lett. 129, 125501 (2022)
Interplay between jamming and MIPS in persistent self-propelling particles
Jing Yang, Ran Ni, and Massimo Pica Ciamarra. Phys. Rev. E, 106, L012601 (2022)
Mismatched ligand density enables ordered assembly of mixed-dimensional, cross-species materials
Tongtao Li#, Xiuyang Xia#, Guanhong Wu, Qingfu Cai, Xuanyu Lyu, Jing Ning, Jing Wang, Min Kuang, Yuchi Yang, Massimo Pica Ciamarra, Ran Ni*, Dong Yang* and Angang Dong*. Science Advances, 8, eabq0969 (2022)
Dynamical Clustering Interrupts Motility Induced Phase Separation in Chiral Active Brownian Particles
Zhan Ma, and Ran Ni*. J. Chem. Phys., 156, 021102 (2022)
2021
Unconventional rheological properties in systems of deformable particles
Anshuman Pasupalak, Shawn Khuhan Samidurai, Yanwei Li, Yuanjian Zheng, Ran Ni, and Massimo Pica Ciamarra. Soft Matter, 17, 7708 (2021)
Self-assembly of isostatic self-dual colloidal crystals
Qunli Lei#, Wei Zheng#, Feng Tang, Xiangang Wan, Ran Ni*, and Yuqiang Ma*. Phys. Rev. Lett., 127, 018001 (2021)
Barrier-Controlled Non-Equilibrium Criticality in Reactive Particle Systems
Qunli Lei, Hao Hu, and Ran Ni*. Phys. Rev. E, 103, 052607 (2021)
Translational and rotational critical-like behaviors in the glass transition of colloidal ellipsoid monolayers
Zhongyu Zheng, Ran Ni, Yuren Wang and Yilong Han. Science Advances, 7, eabd1958 (2021)
2020
Effect of particle size distribution on polydisperse hard disks
Pablo Sampedro Ruiz, and Ran Ni*. J. Chem. Phys. 153, 174501 (2020) [Highlighted as the Editor's Pick]
Entropy-Controlled Crosslinking in Linker-Mediated Vitrimers
Qunli Lei#, Xiuyang Xia#, Juan Yang, Massimo Pica Ciamarra, and Ran Ni*. Proc. Natl Acad. Sci. USA, 117, 27111 (2020)
Frictional Active Brownian Particles
Pin Nie, Joyjit Chattoraj, Antonio Piscitelli, Patrick Doyle, Ran Ni*, and Massimo Pica Ciamarra*. Phys. Rev. E, 102, 032612 (2020)
Hierarchical glass transition of hard hemidisks with local assemblies
Wei Zheng#, Qunli Lei#, Yuqiang Ma, and Ran Ni*. Soft Matter, 16, 8108 (2020)
Supercrystallographic Reconstruction of 3D Nanorod Assembly with Collectively Anisotropic Upconversion Fluorescence
Kerong Deng, Xin Huang, Yulian Liu, Lili Xu, Ruipeng Li, Ji Tang, Qunli Lei, Ran Ni, Chunxia Li, Yong Sheng Zhao, Hongwu Xu, Zhongwu Wang, and Zewei Quan. Nano Lett., 20, 7367 (2020)
Effect of heavy impurities on the dynamics of supercooled liquids
Saurish Chakrabarty, and Ran Ni*. J. Chem. Phys. 152, 234502 (2020)
Dynamic Assembly of Active Colloids: Theory and Simulation
Zhan Ma, Mingcheng Yang, and Ran Ni*. Adv. Theory Simul. 3, 2000021 (2020) [invited review]
Mechanical Tolerance of Cascade Bioreactions via Adaptive Curvature Engineering for Epidermal Bioelectronics
Ting Wang#, Qunli Lei#, Ming Wang, Guoying Deng, Xijian Liu, Chunlin Li, Qi Wang, Zhihua Liu, Jianwu Wang, Zequn Cui, Kevin Goldio Utama, Ran Ni*, and Xiaodong Chen*. Adv. Mater., 32, 2000991 (2020)
Hexatic phase in a model of active biological tissues
Anshuman Pasupalak, Yanwei Li, Ran Ni*, and Massimo Pica Ciamarra*. Soft Matter, 16, 3914 (2020)
Stability phase diagram of active Brownian particles
Pin Nie, Joyjit Chattoraj, Antonio Piscitelli, Patrick Doyle, Ran Ni* and Massimo Pica Ciamarra*. Phys. Rev. Research, 2, 023010 (2020)
Linker-mediated self-assembly of mobile DNA coated colloids
Xiuyang Xia, Hao Hu, Massimo Pica Ciamarra and Ran Ni*. Science Advances, 6, eaaz6921 (2020)
Thermal-disrupting interface mitigates intercellular cohesion loss for accurate topical antibacterial therapy
Benhui Hu, Christopher Berkey, Timothy Feliciano, Xiaohong Chen, Zhuyun Li, Chao Chen, Shahrouz Amini, Mui Hoon Nai, Qunli Lei, Ran Ni, Juan Wang, Wan Ru Leow, Shaowu Pan, Yongqiang Li, Pingqiang Cai, Ali Miserez, Suzhou Li, Chwee Teck Lim, Yun-Long Wu, Teri W. Odom, Reinhold H. Dauskardt and Xiaodong Chen. Adv. Mater., 32, 1907030 (2020)
2019
Hydrodynamics of Random-Organizing Hyperuniform Fluids
Qunli Lei, and Ran Ni*. Proc. Natl Acad. Sci. USA, 116, 22983 (2019)
Melting and re-entrant melting of polydisperse hard disks
Pablo Sampedro Ruiz, Qunli Lei and Ran Ni*. Communications Physics, 2, 70 (2019)
Self-assembled multi-layer simple cubic photonic crystals of oppositely charged colloids in confinement
Krongtum Sankaewtong#, Qunli Lei#, and Ran Ni*. Soft Matter, 15, 3104 (2019) [Cover story]
Non-Equilibrium Strongly Hyperuniform Fluids of Circle Active Particles with Large Local Density Fluctuations
Qunli Lei, Massimo Pica Ciamarra, and Ran Ni*. Science Advances, 5, eaau7423 (2019)
2018
Self-assembled chiral photonic crystals from a colloidal helix racemate
Qunli Lei, Ran Ni*, and Yuqiang Ma. ACS Nano, 12, 6860 (2018)
Entropy stabilizes floppy crystals of mobile DNA-coated colloids
Hao Hu, Pablo Sampedro Ruiz, and Ran Ni*. Phys. Rev. Lett., 120, 048003 (2018)
2017
Driving dynamic colloidal assembly using eccentric self-propelled colloids
Zhan Ma#, Qunli Lei#, and Ran Ni*. Soft Matter, 13, 8940 (2017)
Role of local assembly in the hierarchical crystallization of associating colloidal hard hemispheres
Qunli Lei, Kunn Hadinoto, and Ran Ni*. Phys. Rev. Materials, 1, 052601(R) (2017)
Complexation of Polyelectrolytes with Hydrophobic Drug Molecules in Salt Free Solution: Theory and Simulations
Qunli Lei, Kunn Hadinoto, and Ran Ni*. Langmuir, 33, 3900 (2017)
Self-Assembly of Semiconducting Polymer Amphiphiles for In Vivo Photoacoustic Imaging
Chen Xie, Xu Zhen, Qunli Lei, Ran Ni and Kanyi Pu. Adv. Funct. Mater., 27, 1605397 (2017)
2016
Nucleation in Colloidal Systems: Theory and Simulation
Ran Ni*. Self-Assembling Systems: Theory and Simulation, 288 (2016) WILEY-VCH, Edited by Li-Tang Yan [Invited Review]
Modes of surface premelting in colloidal crystals composed of attractive particles
Bo Li, Feng Wang, Di Zhou, Yi Peng, Ran Ni, and Yilong Han. Nature, 531, 485 (2016) [Highlighted in Nature Physics]
2015
The competition between surface adsorption and folding of fibril-forming polypeptides
Ran Ni*, J. Mieke Kleijn, Sanne Abeln, Martien A. Cohen Stuart, and Peter G. Bolhuis. Phys. Rev. E, 91, 022711 (2015)
Tunable long range forces mediated by self- propelled colloidal hard spheres
Ran Ni*, Martien A. Cohen Stuart, and Peter G. Bolhuis. Phys. Rev. Lett., 114, 018302 (2015) [Highlighted as Editors’ Suggestion]
2014
Crystallizing hard-sphere glasses by doping with active particles
Ran Ni*, Martien A. Cohen Stuart, Marjolein Dijkstra, and Peter G. Bolhuis. Soft Matter, 10 (35) 6609 (2014) [Highlighted as 2014 Soft Matter Hot Papers]
Structural signatures of dynamic heterogeneities in monolayers of colloidal ellipsoids
Zhongyu Zheng, Ran Ni, Feng Wang, Marjolein Dijkstra, Yuren Wang and Yilong Han*. Nature Communications, 5, 3829 (2014)
2013
Pushing glass transition towards random close packing using self-propelled hard spheres
Ran Ni*, Martien A. Cohen Stuart, and Marjolein Dijkstra. Nature Communications, 4, 2704 (2013)
Interplay between folding and assembly of fibril-forming polypeptides
Ran Ni*, Sanne Abeln, Marieke Schor, Martien A. Cohen Stuart, and Peter G. Bolhuis. Phys. Rev. Lett., 111, 058101 (2013)
Effect of bond length fluctuations on crystal nucleation of hard bead chains
Ran Ni* and Marjolein Dijkstra*. Soft Matter, 9, 365 (2013) [Cover story]
2012
Phase diagram of colloidal hard superballs: from cubes via spheres to octahedra
Ran Ni*, Anjan P. Gantapara, Joost de Graaf, Rene van Roij and Marjolein Dijkstra*. Soft Matter, 8, 8826 (2012) [Cover story]
Surface roughness directed self- assembly of patchy particles into colloidal micelles
Daniela J. Kraft*, Ran Ni, Frank Smallenburg, Michiel Hermes, Kisun Yoon, Dave Weitz, Alfons van Blaaderen, Jan Groenewold, Marjolein Dijkstra, Willem K. Kegel. Proc. Natl Acad. Sci. USA, 109, 10787 (2012) [Cover story]
2011
Self-assembly of a colloidal interstitial solid solution with a tunable sublattice doping
L. Filion, M. Hermes, R. Ni, E. C. M. Vermolen, A. Kuijk, C.G. Christova, J. Stiefelhagen, T. Vissers, A. van Blaaderen and M. Dijkstra. Phys. Rev. Lett., 107, 168302 (2011)
Crystal Nucleation in binary hard-sphere mixtures: The effect of order parameter on the cluster composition
Ran Ni#, Frank Smallenburg#, Laura Filion and Marjolein Dijkstra*. Mol. Phys., 109, 1213 (2011).
Simulations of nucleation in almost hard-sphere colloids: The discrepancy between experiment and simulation persists
Laura Filion#, Ran Ni#, Daan Frenkel and Marjolein Dijkstra. J. Chem. Phys., 134, 134901 (2011).
Crystal nucleation of colloidal hard dumbbells
Ran Ni* and Marjolein Dijkstra*. J. Chem. Phys., 134, 034501 (2011)
2010
Glassy dynamics, spinodal fluctuations, and the kinetic limit of nucleation in suspensions of colloidal hard rods
Ran Ni, Simone Belli, Rene van Roij and Marjolein Dijkstra. Phys. Rev. Lett., 105, 088302 (2010)
Crystal nucleation of hard spheres using molecular dynamics, umbrella sampling and forward flux sampling: A comparison of simulation techniques
Laura Filion, Michiel Hermes, Ran Ni and Marjolein Dijkstra. J. Chem. Phys., 133, 244115 (2010)
2008
Polyelectrolyte-Macroion Complexation in 1:1 and 3:1 Salt Contents: A Brownian Dynamics Study
Juan Yang, Ran Ni, Dapeng Cao* and Wenchuan Wang. J. Phys. Chem. B, 112, 16505-16516 (2008)
Effect of Bridging Conformation of Polyelectrolytes on Static and Dynamic Properties of Macroions
Yiyu Hu, Ran Ni, Dapeng Cao* and Wenchuan Wang. Langmuir, 24, 10138 (2008)
Conformation of a Spherical Polyelectrolyte Brush in the Presence of Oppositely Charged Linear Polyelectrolytes
Ran Ni, Dapeng Cao*, Wenchuan Wang and Arben Jusufi. Macromolecules, 41, 5477 (2008)
Release of Lysozyme from the Branched Polyelectrolyte-Lysozyme Complexation
Ran Ni, Dapeng Cao* and Wenchuan Wang. J. Phys. Chem. B, 112, 4393 (2008)
2007
Nanopattern of Inner Surface of Carbon Nanotubes for Self-Assembly of Nanoparticles: A multi-step Monte Carlo method
Ran Ni, Dapeng Cao* and Wenchuan Wang. J. Phys. Chem. C, 111, 11802 (2007)
2006
A Monte Carlo Study of Spherical Electrical Double Layer of Macroions-Polyelectrolytes Systems in Salt Free Solutions
Ran Ni, Dapeng Cao* and Wenchuan Wang. J. Phys. Chem. B, 110, 26232 (2006)
2003
An Optimal Design of Linear Lamp-House
Wu Xue, Minghe Yang and Ran Ni. Chinese Journal of Engineering Mathematics, 20, 19 (2003) (In Chinese)
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* Corresponding author · # Equal contribution. “Selected” follows the selection in the group’s publication list.