Self-replicating devices with dipolar colloids*

Ubiquitous in nature, self-replication on the nano-scale has been challenging to produce in the laboratory. Recent efforts with DNA tiles have shown great success in correctly replicating tile-sequence templates but require frequent manipulation by the experimenter. We propose a scheme for achieving self-replication with dipolar colloids. Dimers in these systems replicate exponentially over millisecond time scales with no intervention other than periodic energy pulses supplied by external fields. We develop a general formalism governing the rate of self-replication as a function of the interval between pulses. Results from kinetic Monte Carlo simulations show good agreement with the growth rates predicted by simple models of the replication process.