Related papers: Thermal breakage of a semiflexible polymer: Breaka…
The fracture and severing of polymer chains plays a critical role in the failure of fibrous materials and the regulated turnover of intracellular filaments. Using continuum wormlike chain models, we investigate the fracture of semiflexible…
We investigate the propagation of a suddenly applied tension along a thermally excited semi-flexible polymer using analytical approximations, scaling arguments and numerical simulation. This problem is inherently non-linear. We find…
Soft polymers are ubiquitous materials in nature and as engineering materials with properties varying from rate-independent to rate-dependent. Current fracture toughness measures are non-unique for rate-dependent soft materials for varying…
Breakage is generally understood in mechanical terms, yet nano-structures can rupture not only under external loads but also via thermal activation. Here we treat in a general framework the statistical mechanics of thermally induced…
In this article we address the problem of Euler's buckling instability in a charged semi-flexible polymer that is under the action of a compressive force. We consider this instability as a phase transition and investigate the role of…
We develop a scaling theory to describe dynamic fluctuations of a semiflexible polymer and find several distinct regimes. We performed simulations to characterize the longitudinal and transverse dynamics; using ensemble averaging for a…
We explore the Mode I fracture toughness of a polymer gel containing a semi-infinite, growing crack. First, an expression is derived for the energy release rate within the linearized, small-strain setting. This expression reveals a crack…
In Part I of this contribution, a systematic coarse-grained description of the dynamics of a weakly-bending semiflexible polymer was developed. Here, we discuss analytical solutions of the established deterministic partial…
We consider the thermal breakage of a tethered polymer chain of discrete segments coupled by Morse potentials under constant tensile stress. The chain dynamics at the onset of fracture is studied analytically by Kramers-Langer…
We follow the dynamics of an ensemble of interacting self-propelled semi-flexible polymers in contact with a thermal bath. We characterize structure and dynamics of the passive system and as a function of the motor activity. We find that…
We study the mechanical properties of semiflexible polymers when the contour length of the polymer is comparable to its persistence length. We compute the exact average end-to-end distance and shape of the polymer for different boundary…
Understanding the nature of glass transition, as well as precise estimation of the glass transition temperature for polymeric materials, remain open questions in both experimental and theoretical polymer sciences. We propose a data-driven…
While of paramount importance in material science, the dynamics of cracks still lacks a complete physical explanation. The transition from their slow creep behavior to a fast propagation regime is a notable key, as it leads to full material…
Theoretical analyses and experiments have been carried out to investigate fracture behavior of glassy polymers. Our birefringence measurements quantify the local stress buildup at cut tip during different stages of drawing. Based on…
We study the model of a partially directed flexible or semi-flexible homopolymer on a square lattice, subject to an externally applied force, in a direction either parallel to, or perpendicular to the preferred direction. The polymer is…
Brittle materials subjected to thermal shocks experience strong temperature gradients that in turn give rise to mechanical stresses that can be large enough to induce fracture. This work presents a complete model for phase-field fracture…
This study investigated, experimentally and numerically, the fracturing behavior of thermoset polymer structures featuring cracks and sharp u-notches. It is shown that, even for cases in which the sharpness of the notch would suggest…
We study the thermal breakage of a discrete one-dimensional string, with open and fixed ends, in the heavily damped regime. Basing our analysis on the multidimensional Kramers escape theory, we are able to make analytical predictions on the…
We have designed a new experimental setup able to investigate fracture of soft materials at small scales. At high crack velocity, where energy is mostly dissipated through viscoelastic processes, we observe an increasingly large high strain…
We analyze static properties of a strongly confined semiflexible polymer, i.e. either trapped in a closed space or compressed by external forces, in an athermal solvent. Like a flexible polymer case, we can resort to an analogy with the…