Related papers: Cross-linking patterns and their images in swollen…
Disordered biopolymer gels have striking mechanical properties including strong nonlinearities. In the case of athermal gels (such as collagen-I) the nonlinearity has long been associated with a crossover from a bending dominated to a…
We use numerical simulations and an athermal quasi-static shear protocol to investigate the yielding of a model colloidal gel. Under increasing deformation, the elastic regime is followed by a significant stiffening before yielding takes…
In this thesis the formation and properties of a polymer gel on and at a surface are investigated. The gel under investigation is defined as a three-dimensional network of "phantom" macromolecules that form permanent links with one another…
The elasticity of disordered and polydisperse polymer networks is a fundamental problem of soft matter physics that is still open. Here, we self-assemble polymer networks via simulations of a mixture of bivalent and tri- or tetravalent…
Polymer gels are comprised of a three-dimensional, cross-linked network that can typically withstand the mechanical deformation associated with both swelling and de-swelling. Thus, gels can be designed with smart behaviors that require both…
Networks of filamentous proteins play a crucial role in cell mechanics. These cytoskeletal networks, together with various crosslinking and other associated proteins largely determine the (visco)elastic response of cells. In this letter we…
We present a generic formulation of the continuum elasticity of an isotropic crosslinked active gel. The gel is described by a two-component model consisting of an elastic network coupled frictionally to a permeating fluid. Activity is…
We study a two-component model for gelation consisting of $f$-functional monomers (the gel) and inert particles (the solvent). After equilibration as a simple liquid, the gel particles are gradually crosslinked to each other until the…
Gels are an increasingly important class of soft materials with applications ranging from regenerative medicine to commodity materials. A major drawback of gels is their relative mechanical weakness, which worsens further under strain. We…
Shear deformation of partially molten rock in laboratory experiments causes the emergence of melt-enriched sheets (bands in cross-section) that are aligned at about 15-20 degrees to the shear plane. Deformation and deviatoric stress also…
We study quasi-static deformation of dense granular packings. The packing is deformed by imposing external boundary conditions, which model engineering experiments such as shear and compression. We propose a two-dimensional network model of…
Physical experiments can characterize the elastic response of granular materials in terms of macroscopic state-variables, namely volume (packing) fraction and stress, while the microstructure is not accessible and thus neglected. Here, by…
We investigate the crystallization of crosslinked and entangled polymers under external deformation using a coarse-grained poly(vinyl alcohol) (CG-PVA) model and molecular dynamics simulations. Following uniaxial deformation, the systems…
We present a theory for the elasticity of cross-linked stiff polymer networks. Stiff polymers, unlike their flexible counterparts, are highly anisotropic elastic objects. Similar to mechanical beams stiff polymers easily deform in bending,…
Ferrogels, i.e., hydrogels loaded with magnetic nanoparticles, have the ability to deform in external magnetic fields. The precise shape of deformation and the alignment of the gel in the field, however, depend on the interplay of several…
Semiflexible polymers such as filamentous actin play a vital role in the mechanical behavior of cells, yet the basic properties of cross-linked F-actin networks remain poorly understood. To address this issue, we have performed numerical…
A polymer network can imbibe water, forming an aggregate called hydrogel, and undergo large and inhomogeneous deformation with external mechanical constraint. Due to the large deformation, nonlinearity plays a crucial role, which also…
We study pattern formation in gels undergoing simultaneous phase separation and orientational ordering. A 2D numerical simulation is performed using a minimal model of nonlinear elasticity with density-anisotropy coupling. For strong…
Molecular dynamic simulation enables one to correlate the evolution of the micro-structure with anisotropic stress when a material is subject to strain. The anisotropic stress due to a constant strain-rate load in a cross-linked polymer is…
We show that gels formed by arrested spinodal decomposition of protein solutions exhibit elastic properties in two distinct frequency domains, both elastic moduli exhibiting a remarkably strong dependence on volume fraction. Considering the…