Related papers: Stretching helical nano-springs at finite temperat…
We show that when a gradually increasing tensile force is applied to the ends of a helical spring with sufficiently large ratios of radius to pitch and twist to bending rigidity, the end-to-end distance undergoes a sequence of discontinuous…
We study the force vs extension behaviour of a helical spring made of a thin torsionally-stiff anisotropic elastic rod. Our focus is on springs of very low helical pitch. For certain parameters of the problem such a spring is found not to…
We examine the effects of thermal fluctuations on thin elastic filaments with non-circular cross-section and arbitrary spontaneous curvature and torsion. Analytical expressions for orientational correlation functions and for the persistence…
We study the effects of thermal flucutations on thin elastic filaments with spontaneous curvature and torsion. We derive analytical expressions for the orientational correlation functions and for the persistence length of helices, and find…
We use numerical simulations to show how a fully flexible filament binding to a deformable cylindrical surface may acquire a macroscopic persistence length and a helical conformation. This is a result of the nontrivial elastic response to…
Helical objects are often implemented in electronic or mechanical micro-systems, requiring a precise understanding of their mechanical properties. While helices formed by cylindrical filaments have been intensely investigated, little is…
The nonlinear dynamics of an elastic filament that is forced to rotate at its base is studied by hydrodynamic simulation techniques; coupling between stretch, bend, twist elasticity and thermal fluctuations is included. The…
We study the non-monotonic force-extension behaviour of helical ribbons using a new model for inextensible elastic strips. Unlike previous rod models our model predicts hysteresis behaviour for low-pitch ribbons of arbitrary material…
A general expression for the elastic potential energy of a helical spring is derived using the basic concepts of elasticity theory and geometry. Both the translational and the rotational displacement of the spring's moving ends are…
We investigate the elastic energy stored in a filament pair as a function of applied twist by measuring torque under prescribed end-to-end separation conditions. We show that the torque increases rapidly to a peak with applied twist when…
We derive a reduced quasi-one-dimensional theory of geometrically frustrated elastic ribbons. Expressed in terms of geometric properties alone, it applies to ribbons over a wide range of scales, allowing the study of their elastic…
We study slender, helical elastic rods subject to distributed forces and moments. Focussing on the case when the helix axis remains straight, we employ the method of multiple scales to systematically derive an 'equivalent-rod' theory from…
We theoretically study the conformations of a helical semi-flexible filament confined to a flat surface. This squeezed helix exhibits a variety of unexpected shapes resembling circles, waves or spirals depending on the material parameters.…
The flexibility of short DNA fragments is studied by a Hamiltonian model which treats the inter-strand and intra-strand forces at the level of the base pair. The elastic response of a set of homogeneous helices to externally applied forces…
A new strain energy function for the hyperelastic modelling of ligaments and tendons whose fascicles have a helical arrangement of fibrils is derived. The stress-strain response of a single fascicle whose fibrils exhibit varying levels of…
The flexibility of short DNA chains is investigated via computation of the average correlation function between dimers which defines the persistence length. Path integration techniques have been applied to confine the phase space available…
We analyze the stretching elasticity of a wormlike chain with a tension discontinuity resulting from a Hookean spring connecting its backbone to a fixed point. The elasticity of isolated semiflexible filaments has been the subject in a…
We combine experiments with simulations to investigate the fluid-structure interaction of a flexible helical rod rotating in a viscous fluid, under low Reynolds number conditions. Our analysis takes into account the coupling between the…
We study the influence of thermal fluctuations on the fracture of elastic networks, via simulations of the uniaxial extension of central-force spring networks with varying rigidity, i.e. connectivity. Studying their failure response, both…
We analyze experimentally the shape of a long elastic filament rotating in a viscous liquid. We identify a continuous but sharp transition from a straight to an helical shape, resulting from the competition between viscous stresses and…