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Elastic sheets with macroscopic dimensions are easy to deform by bending and stretching. Yet shaping nanometric sheets by mechanical manipulation is hard. Here we show that nanoparticle self-assembly could be used to this end. We…
Atomic Force Microscopy (AFM) combined with electrical modes provides a powerful contactless approach to characterize material electrical properties at the nanoscale. However, conventional electrostatic models often overlook dynamic charge…
Changes in the geometry and topology of self-assembled membranes underlie diverse processes across cellular biology and engineering. Similar to lipid bilayers, monolayer colloidal membranes have in-plane fluid-like dynamics and out-of-plane…
We present results on a series of 2D atomistic computer simulations of amorphous systems subjected to simple shear in the athermal, quasistatic limit. The athermal quasistatic trajectories are shown to separate into smooth, reversible…
We study the buckling of elastic spherical shells under osmotic pressure with the osmolyte concentration of the exterior solution as control parameter. We compare our results for the bifurcation behavior with results for buckling under…
We consider planar liquid crystal elastomers: two dimensional objects made of anisotropic responsive materials, that upon activation remain flat however change their planar shape. We derive a closed form, analytical solution based on the…
Molecular dynamics simulations have been performed on pure liquid water, aqueous solutions of sodium chloride, and polymer solutions exposed to a strong external electric field with the goal to gain molecular insight into the structural…
Liquid crystal elastomers represent a novel class of programmable shape-transforming materials whose shape change trajectory is encoded in the material's nematic director field. Using three-dimensional nonlinear finite element…
Polymer electrolytes are intensely investigated for use as solid electrolytes in next generation lithium-ion and lithium-metal batteries. However, little is known about the structural and dynamical properties of polymer electrolytes close…
Based on a coordinate transformation approach, Pendry {\it et al.} have reported electromagnetically anisotropic and inhomogeneous shells that, in theory, completely shield an interior structure of arbitrary size from electromagnetic fields…
Soft matter materials, such as polymers, membranes, proteins, are often electrically charged. This makes them water soluble, which is of great importance in technological application and a prerequisite for biological function. We discuss a…
A multiple-image method is developed to accurately calculate the electrostatic interaction between neutral dielectric particles and a uniformly charged dielectric substrate. The difference in dielectric constants between the particle and…
We present a new finite deformation, dynamic finite element model that incorporates surface tension to capture elastocapillary effects on the electromechanical deformation of dielectric elastomers. We demonstrate the significant effect that…
The dynamics of membranes, shells and capsules in fluid flow has become an active research area in computational physics and computational biology. The small thickness of these elastic materials enables their efficient approximation as a…
Nanoparticles in solution acquire charge through dissociation or association of surface groups. Thus, a proper description of their electrostatic interactions requires the use of charge-regulating boundary conditions rather than the…
We present an atomistic model of a single nanoparticle with core/shell structure that takes into account its lattice strucutre and spherical geometry, and in which the values of microscopic parameters such as anisotropy and exchange…
The coupling of electric fields to the mechanics of lipid membranes gives rise to intriguing electromechanical behavior, as, for example, evidenced by the deformation of lipid vesicles in external electric fields. Electromechanical effects…
Active-elastic instabilities are common phenomena in the natural world which have the aspect of sudden mechanical morphings. Frequently, the driving force of the instability mechanisms has a chemo-mechanical nature which makes these kind of…
The electrostatic contribution to spontaneous membrane curvature is calculated within Poisson-Boltzmann theory under a variety of assumptions and emphasizing parameters in the physiological range. Asymmetric surface charges, either fixed…
We propose an approach to measure surface elastic constants of soft solids. Generally, this requires one to probe interfacial mechanics at around the elastocapillary length scale, which is typically microscopic. Deformations of microscopic…