Direct observation of a buckling transition during the formation of thin colloidal crystals

We have investigated a colloidal suspension in a thin wedge formed by two glass plates in the presence of a lateral pressure. Starting with a single hexagonal layer, with increasing separation between the glass plates additional layers are added. This process is accompanied by a number of structural transitions necessary to maintain a high packing fraction under the given boundary conditions. Besides the well-known sequence of hexagonal and quadratic phases, we observe two new phases which are identified with the buckling and the rhombic phase recently predicted by other authors.