Related papers: Studies of reversible capsid shell growth
Understanding how growth induces form is a longstanding biological question. Many studies concentrated on the shapes of plant cells, fungi or bacteria. Some others have shown the importance of the mechanical properties of bacterial walls…
Curved structures in soft matter and biological systems commonly emerge as a result of self-assembly processes where building blocks aggregate in a controlled manner, giving rise to specific system structure and properties. Learning how to…
We report small-angle x-ray scattering (SAXS) experiments on aqueous dispersions of colloidal silica with a broad monomodal size distribution (polydispersity 18%, size 8 nm). Over a range of volume fractions the silica particles segregate…
We develop equilibrium and kinetic theories that describe the assembly of viral capsid proteins on a charged central core, as seen in recent experiments in which brome mosaic virus (BMV) capsids assemble around nanoparticles functionalized…
Crystallization of proteins, specifically proteins of medical relevance, is performed for various reasons such as to understand the protein structure and to design therapies. Obtaining kinetic constants in rate laws for nucleation and…
This paper uses combinatorics and group theory to answer questions about the assembly of icosahedral viral shells. Although the geometric structure of the capsid (shell) is fairly well understood in terms of its constituent subunits, the…
Hollow microgels are elastic polymer shells easily realizable in experiments. Recent works have shown the emergence of buckling events in dilute hollow microgels under the effect of an added osmotic pressure. Here, we perform large-scale…
The asymptotic shape of randomly growing radial clusters is studied. We pose the problem in terms of the dynamics of stochastic partial differential equations. We concentrate on the properties of the realizations of the stochastic growth…
Fundamental theories and models of many-body physics can be probed in experiments on ultracold atoms held in place by electromagnetic fields. In particular, of considerable interest are systems under curved confinement, since they can yield…
Studying physical mechanisms and common geometric principles underlying known spherical packings is crucial for rational design of synthetic nanocontainers. Here we model the growth of small spherical shells containing n<72 identical…
Self-organized complex structures in nature, e.g. viral capsids, hierarchical biopolymers, and bacterial flagella, offer efficiency, adaptability, robustness, and multi-functionality. Can we program the self-assembly of three-dimensional…
Morphogenesis of complex body shapes is reproducible despite the noise inherent in the underlying morphogenetic processes. However, how these morphogenetic processes work together to achieve this reproducibility remains unclear. Here, we…
Motile organisms can form stable agglomerates such as cities or colonies. In the outbreak of a highly contagious disease, the control of large-scale epidemic spread depends on factors like the number and size of agglomerates, travel rate…
We propose a description for the quasi-equilibrium self-assembly of small, single-stranded (ss) RNA viruses whose capsid proteins (CPs) have flexible, positively charged, disordered tails that associate with the negatively charged RNA…
Recent studies reveal that certain viruses package a portion of their genome in a manner that mirrors the icosahedral symmetry of the protein container, or capsid. Graph theoretical constraints forbid exact realization of icosahedral…
How multicellular life forms evolved out from unicellular ones constitutes a major problem in our understanding of the evolution of our biosphere. A recent set of experiments involving yeast cell populations has shown that selection for…
Viruses are biological nanosystems with a capsid of protein-made capsomer units that encloses and protects the genetic material responsible for their replication. Here we show how the geometrical constraints of the capsomer-capsomer…
Soft particles are known to overlap and form stable clusters that self-assemble into periodic crystalline phases with density-independent lattice constants. We use molecular dynamics simulations in two dimensions to demonstrate that,…
The surface curvature of membranes, interfaces, and substrates plays a crucial role in shaping the self-assembly of particles adsorbed on these surfaces. However, little is known about the interplay between particle anisotropy and surface…
A vital constituent of a virus is its protein shell, called the viral capsid, that encapsulates and hence provides protection for the viral genome. Assembly models are developed for viral capsids built from protein building blocks that can…