Related papers: Centrifugal compression of soft particle packings …
Several methods for measuring the compressive strength of strong particulate gels are available, including the centrifuge method, whereby the strength as a function of volume-fraction is obtained parametrically from the dependence of…
We report temperature-responsive soft composites of semiflexible biopolymer networks (fibrin) containing dispersed microgel colloidal particles of poly(N-isopropylacrylamide) (pNIPAM) that undergo a thermodynamically driven de-swelling…
We exploit the controlled drying of millimeter-sized gel beads to investigate isotropic compression of colloidal fractal gels. Using a custom dynamic light scattering setup, we demonstrate that stresses imposed by drying on the bead surface…
We synthesize thermoresponsive poly(N-isopropylacrylamide) (PNIPAM) colloidal microgel particles of different stiffnesses by controlling the concentration of crosslinker in a one-pot synthesis method. We employ oscillatory rheology and…
In this third and final paper of a series, elastic properties of numerically simulated isotropic packings of spherical beads assembled by different procedures and subjected to a varying confining pressure P are investigated. In addition P,…
We use dedicated microfluidic devices to expose soft hydrogel particles to a rapid change in the externally applied osmotic pressure and observe a non-monotonic response: After an initial rapid compression the particle slowly reswells to…
Large deformations of soft elastic beads spinning at high angular velocity in a denser background fluid are investigated theoretically, numerically, and experimentally using millimeter-size polyacrylamide hydrogel particles introduced in a…
Polymer microgels exhibit intriguing macroscopic flow properties arising from their unique microscopic structure. Microgel colloids usually comprise a crosslinked polymer network with a radially decaying density profile, resulting in a…
Using a thermodynamical approach, we calculate the deformation of a spherical elastic particle placed on a rigid substrate, under zero external load, and including an ingredient of importance in soft matter: the interfacial tension of the…
We analyze the isotropic compaction of mixtures composed of rigid and deformable incompressible particles by the non-smooth contact dynamics approach (NSCD). The deformable bodies are simulated using a hyper-elastic neo-Hookean constitutive…
In granular media, the presence of even small amounts of interparticle cohesion manifests as an increase in the bulk strength and stiffness, effects that are typically associated with an increase in the average number of constraints per…
Stress-strain measurements and ultrasound propagation experiments in glass bead packs have been simultaneously conducted to characterize the stress-induced anisotropy under uniaxial loading. These measurements, realized respectively with…
Microgels are soft colloidal particles that, when dispersed in a solvent, swell and deswell in response to changes in environmental conditions, such as temperature, concentration, and $p$H. Using Monte Carlo simulation, we model bulk…
This is an integrated experimental and theoretical study of the dynamics and rheology of self-crosslinked, slightly charged, temperature responsive soft Poly(N-isopropylacrylamide) (pNIPAM) microgels over a wide range of concentration and…
Predicting the mechanical response of the soft gel materials under external deformation is of paramount importance in many areas, such as foods, pharmaceuticals, solid-liquid separations, cosmetics, aerogels and drug delivery. Most of the…
We present an integrated experimental and quantitative theoretical study of the mechanics of self-crosslinked, neutral, repulsive pNIPAM microgel suspensions over concentration (c) range spanning the fluid, glassy and putative "soft jammed"…
Temperature-sensitive hydrogels based on polymers such as poly(N-isopropylacrylamide) (PNIPAM) undergo a volume phase transition in response to changes in temperature. During this transition, distinct changes in both thermal and mechanical…
We investigate the elastic properties of small droplets under compression. The compression of a bubble by two parallel plates is solved exactly and it is shown that a lowest-order expansion of the solution reduces to a form similar to that…
Layers obtained by drying a colloidal dispersion of silica spheres are found to be a good benchmark to test the elastic behaviour of porous media, in the challenging case of high porosities and nano-sized microstructures. Classically used…
Extra-large deformations in ultra-soft elastic materials are ubiquitous, yet systematic studies and methods to understand the mechanics of such huge strains are lacking. Here we investigate this complex problem systematically with a simple…