# Limiting the valence: advancements and new perspectives on patchy colloids, soft functionalized nanoparticles and biomolecules

## TL;DR

This review discusses how limited bonding valence and anisotropic interactions in patchy colloids, nanoparticles, and biomolecules enable the design of complex, functional self-assembled structures with tailored properties.

## Contribution

It provides a comprehensive overview of recent advancements and new perspectives on the design and assembly of systems with limited valence, including colloids, nanoparticles, and biomolecules.

## Key findings

- Design of interaction patterns enables tailored structures
- Anisotropic interactions lead to diverse self-assembled architectures
- Limited valence is key to creating complex functional materials

## Abstract

Limited bonding valence, usually accompanied by well-defined directional interactions and selective bonding mechanisms, is nowadays considered among the key ingredients to create complex structures with tailored properties: even though isotropically interacting units already guarantee access to a vast range of functional materials, anisotropic interactions can provide extra instructions to steer the assembly of specific architectures. The anisotropy of effective interactions gives rise to a wealth of self-assembled structures both in the realm of suitably synthesized nano- and micro-sized building blocks and in nature, where the isotropy of interactions is often a zero-th order description of the complicated reality. In this review, we span a vast range of systems characterized by limited bonding valence, from patchy colloids of new generation to polymer-based functionalized nanoparticles, DNA-based systems and proteins, and describe how the interaction patterns of the single building blocks can be designed to tailor the properties of the target final structures.