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One of the most exciting areas in colloid research is the control of interparticleinteractions to generate new structures. The ease of tuning interactions, size, shape,and composition has made these nano- and micrometer sized particles appealingprobes for a number of fundamental studies. I will describe how time-varyingmagnetic fields drive a suspension of superparamagnetic colloids to undergo phasetransitions that display interesting collective fluctuations. Particle tracking allows usto see these “colloidal atoms” to track the nucleation of crystals or the dynamics ofspinodal decomposition from a metastable liquid. I will attempt to answer thequestion: can classical thermodynamic expressions be applied to these field-drivencolloidal systems?