Morphological instability of spherical soft particles induced by surface charges

We here demonstrate that surface charges on a spherical soft particle may induce its morphology instability. It is found that various patterns can be obtained by varying the surface charge density. The critical condition for the occurrence of surface instability and the wavelength of the induced surface patterns are derived analytically and, thereby, the morphological phase diagram of soft particles can be provided easily. Besides the electric stress, surface tension also plays a significant role in the surface evolution process. In addition, the morphological evolution behavior of a soft particle is demonstrated to exhibit distinct dependence on its size.