Related papers: Intrinsic Defect Formation in Peptide Self-Assembl…
The experiments on verification of the Kibble-Zurek mechanism showed that topological defects are formed most efficiently in the systems of small size or low (quasi-)dimensionality, whereas in the macroscopic two- and three-dimensional…
The formation of a viral capsid -- the highly-ordered protein shell that surrounds the genome of a virus -- is the canonical example of self-assembly. The capsids of many positive-sense RNA viruses spontaneously assemble from in vitro…
In materials science, point defects play a crucial role in materials properties. This is particularly well known for the wide band gap insulators where the defect formation/compensation determines the equilibrium Fermi level and generally…
In the self-assembly process which drives the formation of cellular membranes, micelles, and capsids, a collection of separated subunits spontaneously binds together to form functional and more ordered structures. In this work, we study the…
Hollow microgels are elastic polymer shells easily realizable in experiments. Recent works have shown the emergence of buckling events in dilute hollow microgels under the effect of an added osmotic pressure. Here, we perform large-scale…
A series of simulations aimed at elucidating the self-assembly dynamics of spherical virus capsids is described. This little-understood phenomenon is a fascinating example of the complex processes that occur in the simplest of organisms.…
Protein folding, peptide aggregation and crystallization, as well as adsorption of molecules on soft or solid substrates have an essential feature in common: In all these processes, structure formation is guided by a collective, cooperative…
Self-assembly processes are widespread in nature, and lie at the heart of many biological and physical phenomena. The characteristics of self-assembly building blocks determine the structures that they form. Two crucial properties are the…
The folding of a polypeptide is an example of the cooperative effects of the amino-acid residues. Of recent interest is how a secondary structure, such as a helix, spontaneously forms during the collapse of a peptide from an initial…
We present a dynamical model of crystal growth, in which it is possible to reliably achieve asymmetric products, beginning from symmetric initial conditions and growing within an isotropic environment. The asymmetric growth is the result of…
Macromolecules can form regular structures on inert surfaces. We have developed a combined empirical and modeling approach to derive the bonding. From experimental scanning tunneling microscopy (STM) images of structures formed on Au(111)…
The self-assembly of complex structures from engineered subunits is a major goal of nanotechnology, but controlling their size becomes increasingly difficult in larger assemblies. Existing strategies present significant challenges, among…
Recently, the successful synthesis of the pentagonal form of PdTe$_{2}$ monolayer (\emph{p}-PdTe$_{2}$) was reported [Liu~\emph{et al.}, Nature Materials \textbf{23}, 1339 (2024)]. In this work, we present an extensive first-principles…
We investigate the mechanical origin of polymorphic structures in two-dimensional tubulin assemblies, of which microtubules are the best known example. These structures feature twisted ribbons, flat tubulin sheets, macrotubules, and hoops,…
The assembly of colloids in nematic liquid crystals via topological defects has been extensively studied for spherical particles, and investigations of other colloid shapes have revealed a wide array of new assembly behaviors. We show,…
The self-assembly of polymer grafted nanoparticles is more and more used in the field of functional materials. However, there is still a lack of analysis on the dynamic transformation paths of different self-assembly morphologies, which…
Studying the atomic structure of intrinsic defects in two-dimensional transition metal dichalcogenides is difficult since they damage quickly under the intense electron irradiation in transmission electron microscopy (TEM). However, this…
Colloidal nanoplatelets - quasi-two-dimensional sheets of semiconductor exhibiting efficient, spectrally pure fluorescence - form when liquid-phase syntheses of spherical quantum dots are modified. Despite intense interest in their…
When thin films are grown on a substrate by chemical vapor deposition, the evolution of the first deposited layers may be described, on mesoscopic scales, by dynamical models of the reaction-diffusion type. For monoatomic layers, such…
Cyanobacteria sequester photosynthetic enzymes into microcompartments which facilitate the conversion of carbon dioxide into sugars. Geometric similarities between these structures and self-assembling viral capsids have inspired models that…