Related papers: Unfolding Large Biomolecules
Metabolism displays striking and robust regularities in the forms of modularity and hierarchy, whose composition may be compactly described. This renders metabolic architecture comprehensible as a system, and suggests the order in which…
Ultrasound-driven microbubbles rectify oscillatory motion into strong steady streaming flow [1, 2]. In this fluid dynamics video, we show size-dependent trapping, focusing and sorting of microparticles, utilizing the interaction between…
The recent interest in using microorganisms for biofuels is motivation enough to study bioconvection and cell dispersion in tubes subject to imposed flow. To optimize light and nutrient uptake, many microorganisms swim in directions biased…
Optical dipole-traps are used in various scientific fields, including classical optics, quantum optics and biophysics. Here, we propose and implement a dipole-trap for nanoparticles that is based on focusing from the full solid angle with a…
We explore trapped ions as a setting to investigate non-equilibrium phases in a generalised Dicke model of dissipative spins coupled to phonon modes. We find a rich dynamical phase diagram including superradiant-like regimes, dynamical…
We study the dynamics of atoms in optical traps when exposed to laser cooling light that induces light-assisted collisions. We experimentally prepare individual atom pairs and observe their evolution. Due to the simplicity of the system…
We analyse the possibility of cooling ions with a single laser beam, due to the coupling between the three components of their motion induced by the Coulomb interaction. For this purpose, we numerically study the dynamics of ion clouds of…
Many living and physical systems such as cell aggregates, tissues or bacterial colonies behave as unconventional systems of particles that are strongly constrained by volume exclusion and shape interactions. Understanding how these…
We study experimentally and theoretically discrete solitons in crystalline structures consisting of several tens of laser-cooled ions confined in a radiofrequency trap. Resonantly exciting localized, spectrally gapped vibrational modes of…
The dynamics of an active walker in a harmonic potential is studied experimentally, numerically and theoretically. At odds with usual models of self-propelled particles, we identify two dynamical states for which the particle condensates at…
Droplets are essential for spatially controlling biomolecules in cells. To work properly, cells need to control the emergence and morphology of droplets. On the one hand, driven chemical reactions can affect droplets profoundly. For…
Cells coexist together in colonies or as tissues. Their behaviour is controlled by an interplay between intercellular forces and biochemical regulation. We develop a simple model of the cell cycle, the fundamental regulatory network…
Motile cilia are a striking example of functional cellular organelle, conserved across all the eukaryotic species. Motile cilia allow swimming of cells and small organisms and transport of liquids across epithelial tissues. Whilst the…
Cross-reactions and other systematic issues generated by the coupling of functional chemical subsystems pose the largest challenge for assembling a viable protocell in the laboratory. Our current work seeks to identify and clarify such key…
Inside every living cell is the cytoplasm: a fluid mixture of thousands of different macromolecules, predominantly proteins. This mixture is where most of the biochemistry occurs that enables living cells to function, and it is perhaps the…
This thesis provides an overview of an approach to quantum simulations using magnesium-25 ions stored in a linear Paul trap as the carriers of quantum information. Their quantum state is manipulated and read out using ultraviolet laser…
Life has a special status, it even has its own science: biology. In many ways, the logic of life seems to differ from that of atoms, molecules, planets, or any other `inanimate object'. However, life is increasingly measured using…
Biological adhesion is a critical mechanical function of complex organisms operating at multiple scales. At the cellular scale, cell-cell adhesion is remarkably tunable to enable both cohesion and malleability during development,…
Particles that can be trapped in optical tweezers range from tens of microns down to tens of nanometres in size. Interestingly, this size range includes large macromolecules. We show experimentally, in agreement with theoretical…
A common feature of biological self-organization is how active agents communicate with each other or their environment via chemical signaling. Such communications, mediated by self-generated chemical gradients, have consequences for both…