Closed Loop Navigation of a Complex State Space: Assembling Anisotropic Colloids into Perfect Crystals

-scale tunable dipolar potentials, identifying low dimensional reaction coordinates that capture all states and pathways, and designing control policies informed by microstructure evolution on underlying free energy landscapes. The resulting control scheme enables rapid assembly along dynamic pathways on different energy landscapes that circumvent and/or repair orientational defects in nematic states and positional defects in crystal states. Our findings demonstrate a generalizable first-principles approach to control microscopic assembly processes with broad implications to understanding stochastic nonequilibrium self-assembly dynamics and realizing high-value-added microstructured materials.