Inspired by biological systems, synthetic reaction networks have been designed that exhibit transient assembly states, broadly referred to as chemically fueled dissipative assembly . Here chemical fuel is added to an ensemble of building blocks, such as colloids , polymers , proteins , or small molecules , that activates them to assemble . The assembled structures persist while fuel is available and autonomously deactivate via a separate reaction pathway when fuel is exhausted, causing disassembly. Dissipative assembly therefore enables forming transient soft materials that autonomously degrade following a single initial injection of chemical fuel. In particular, a few methods have been discovered for transiently assembling colloids, including enzymatic DNA reaction networks , pH clock reactions , and chemical reaction induced changes to colloid surface chemistry .