Related papers: Syneresis and delayed detachment in agar plates
The behavior of two-dimensional electron gas (2DEG) in extreme coupling limits are reasonably well-understood, but our understanding of intermediate region remains limited. Strongly interacting electrons crystalize into a solid phase known…
In this work, we investigate the ageing behavior of soft glassy solids of aqueous suspension of laponite under shear flow. We observe that when an imposed time is normalized by a dominating relaxation time of the system, the rheological…
We visualize entanglements in polymer melts using molecular dynamics simulation. A bead at an entanglement interacts persistently for long times with the non-bonded beads (those excluding the adjacent ones in the same chain). The…
We map the ultrasonic (8 MHz) speed and attenuation of edible-grade gelatin in water, exploring the key dependencies on temperature, concentration and time. The ultrasonic signatures of the sol-gel transition, confirmed by rheological…
We devise a soft, solvent-free, coarse-grained model for lipid bilayer membranes. The non-bonded interactions take the form of a weighted-density functional which allows us to describe the thermodynamics of self-assembly and packing effects…
Dynamic Light Scattering (DLS) measurements were performed on colloidal suspensions of Laponite\textsuperscript{\textregistered} at different concentrations in the range $C_\text{w}= (1.5{\div}3.0)$%. The slowing down of the dynamics…
Microgels are soft colloids that, in virtue of their polymeric nature, can react to external stimuli such as temperature or pH by changing their size. The resulting swelling/deswelling transition can be exploited in fundamental research as…
A droplet of surfactant spreading on an ultrasoft ($E \lesssim 100$ Pa) gel substrate will produce capillary fractures at the gel surface; these fractures originate at the contact-line and propagate outwards in a starburst pattern. There is…
Polymer networks and biological tissues are often swollen by a solvent, such that their properties emerge from a coupling between swelling and elastic stress. This poroelastic coupling becomes particularly intricate in wetting, adhesion,…
We present the results of an experimental investigation into buoyant rigid spheres rising through highly concentrated collections of hydrated hydrogel particles. The volume fraction of particles is such that the mechanical properties of the…
We systematically explore the self-assembly of semi-flexible polymers in deformable spherical confinement across a wide regime of chain stiffness, contour lengths and packing fractions by means of coarse-grained molecular dynamics…
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…
We consider what can be learnt about the processes of gas accretion and depletion from the kinematic misalignment between the cold/warm gas and stars in local early-type galaxies. Using simple analytic arguments and a toy model of the…
Microrheology, the study of fluids on micron length-scales, promises to reveal insights into cellular biology, including mechanical biomarkers of disease and the interplay between biomechanics and cellular function. Here a…
The presence of a very small amount of high molecular weight polymer significantly delays the pinch-off singularity of a drop of water falling from a faucet, and leads to the formation of a long-lived cylindrical filament. In this paper we…
Cellulose nanocrystals (CNC) are naturally-derived nanostructures of growing importance for the production of composites having attractive mechanical properties, and offer improved sustainability over purely petroleum-based alternatives.…
A recent hypothesis claims that the glass transition itself, though it is a very pronounced relaxation peak, is no separate relaxation process at all, but is just the breakdown of the shear modulus due to the weak elastic dipole interaction…
We studied the microscopic polymer conformations in the droplet detachment process of an elastic semi-dilute polyelectrolytic Xanthan solution by measuring the instantaneous birefringence. As in earlier studies, we observe the suppression…
The patterns arising from the differential swelling of gels are investigated experimentally and theoretically as a model for the differential growth of living tissues. Two geometries are considered: a thin strip of soft gel clamped to a…
Understanding dynamic and complex interaction of biological membranes with extracellular matrices plays a crucial role in controlling a variety of cell behavior and functions, from cell adhesion and growth to signaling and differentiation.…