Related papers: Force focusing in confined fibers and sheets
Thin sheets respond to confinement by smoothly wrinkling, or by focusing stress into small, sharp regions. From engineering to biology, geology, textiles, and art, thin sheets are packed and confined in a wide variety of ways, and yet…
We study the drag force on discrete objects with circular cross section moving slowly through a spherical granular medium. Variations in the geometry of the dragged object change the drag force only by a small fraction relative to shape…
When transported in confined geometries rigid fibers show interesting transport dynamics induced by friction with the top and bottom walls. Fiber flexibility causes an additional coupling between fiber deformation and transport and is…
The curvature potential arising from confining a particle initially in three-dimensional space onto a curved surface is normally derived in the hard constraint $q \to 0$ limit, with $q$ the degree of freedom normal to the surface. In this…
We investigate the force of flowing granular material on an obstacle. A sphere suspended in a discharging silo experiences both the weight of the overlaying layers and drag of the surrounding moving grains. In experiments with frictional…
We examine the shape change of a thin disk with an inserted wedge of material when it is pushed against a plane, using analytical, numerical and experimental methods. Such sheets occur in packaging, surgery and nanotechnology. We…
We study numerically the influence of confinement on the solid fraction and on the structure of three-dimensional random close packed (RCP) granular materials subject to gravity. The effects of grain shape (spherical or polyhedral),…
In order to understand the nature of friction in closely-packed granular materials, a discrete element simulation on granular layers subjected to isobaric plain shear is performed. It is found that the friction coefficient increases as the…
Studies of random close packing of spheres have advanced our knowledge about the structure of systems such as liquids, glasses, emulsions, granular media, and amorphous solids. When these systems are confined their structural properties…
We report on systematic measurements of the distribution of normal forces exerted by granular material under uniaxial compression onto the interior surfaces of a confining vessel. Our experiments on three-dimensional, random packings of…
We study the equilibrium configurations related to the growth of an elastic fibre in a confining flexible ring. This system represents a paradigm for a variety of biological, medical, and engineering problems. We consider a simplified…
We present a systematic investigation of the distribution of normal forces at the boundaries of static packings of spheres. A new method for the efficient construction of large hexagonal-close-packed crystals is introduced and used to study…
The behaviour and fate of tissue cells is controlled by the rigidity and geometry of their adhesive environment, possibly through forces localized to sites of adhesion. We introduce a mechanical model that predicts cellular force…
The shape of materials is often subject to a number of geometric constraints that limit the size of the system or fix the structure of its boundary. In soft and biological materials, however, these constraints are not always hard, but are…
We study, numerically and analytically, the forced transport of deformable containers through a narrow constriction. Our central aim is to quantify the competition between the constriction geometry and the active forcing, regulating whether…
We calculate the force of a near-resonant guided light field of an ultrathin optical fiber on a two-level atom. We show that, if the atomic dipole rotates in the meridional plane, the magnitude of the force of the guided light depends on…
We simulate a two dimensional model of self-propelled particles confined by a deformable boundary. The particles tend to accumulate near the boundary and the shape of the boundary deforms upon the collisions. We find that there are two…
We provide a two dimensional deformation model to describe how soft squishy circular particles respond to external forces and collisions. This model involves formulating mathematical equations and algorithms for the shape of a deformed…
Motivated by the centering of biological objects in large cells, we study the generic properties of centering forces inside a ball (or a volume of spherical topology) in $n$ dimensions. We consider two scenarios : autonomous centering (in…
The shape assumed by a slender elastic structure is a function both of the geometry of the space in which it exists and the forces it experiences. We explore by experiments and theoretical analysis, the morphological phase-space of a…