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We study the structural features and underlying principles of multi-dislocation ground states of a crystalline spherical cap. In the continuum limit where the ratio of crystal size to lattice spacing $W/a$ diverges, dislocations proliferate…
We study the structure and elastic energy of the ground states of crystalline caps conforming to a spherical surface. These ground states consist of positive disclination defects in structures spanning from flat and weakly curved crystals…
Whereas disclination defects are energetically prohibitive in two-dimensional flat crystals, their existence is necessary in crystals with spherical topology, such as viral capsids, colloidosomes or fullerenes. Such a geometrical…
We numerically investigate crystalline order on negative Gaussian curvature capillary bridges. In agreement with the experimental results in [W. Irvine et al., Nature, "Pleats in crystals on curved surfaces", 2010, (468), 947]} we observe…
Point defects are ubiquitous in two dimensional crystals and play a fundamental role in determining their mechanical and thermodynamical properties. When crystals are formed on a curved background, finite length grain boundaries (scars) are…
We show that topological defects in an ion-doped nematic liquid crystal can be used to manipulate the surface charge distribution on chemically homogeneous, charge-regulating external surfaces, using a minimal theoretical model. In…
We study the relationship between topological defect formation and ground-state packings in a model of repulsions in external confining potentials. Specifically we consider screened 2D Coulombic repulsions, which conveniently parameterizes…
Geometry and topology play a fundamental role in determining pattern formation on 2D surfaces in condensed matter physics. For example, local positive Gaussian curvature of a 2D surface attracts positive topological defects in a liquid…
Topological defects are crucial to the thermodynamics and structure of condensed matter systems. For instance, when incorporated into crystalline membranes like graphene, disclinations with positive and negative topological charge…
We study the ground state properties of classical Coulomb charges interacting with a 1/r potential moving on a plane but confined either by a circular hard wall boundary or by a harmonic potential. The charge density in the continuum limit…
We find an order-disorder transition from crystals to disordered crystals for static packings of frictionless spheres. While the geometric indicators are mostly blind to the transition, disordered crystals already exhibit properties apart…
We study the low-temperature regime of an atomic liquid on the hyperbolic plane by means of molecular dynamics simulation and we compare the results to a continuum theory of defects in a negatively curved hexagonal background. In agreement…
We investigate experimentally and numerically the defect configurations emerging when a cholesteric liquid crystal is confined to a spherical shell. We uncover a rich scenario of defect configurations, some of them non-existent in nematic…
We investigate a counterintuitive geometric interaction between defects and curvature in thin layers of superfluids, superconductors and liquid crystals deposited on curved surfaces. Each defect feels a geometric potential whose functional…
The energetically optimal position of lattice defects on intrinsically curved surfaces is a complex function of shape parameters. For open surfaces, a simple condition predicts the critical size for which a central disclination yields lower…
Recent experiments have shown that colloidal crystals confined to weakly curved capillary bridges introduce groups of dislocations organized into `pleats' as means to relieve the stress caused by the Gaussian curvature of the surface. We…
We develop the theory of the coupling between in-plane order and out-of-plane geometry in twisted, two-dimensionally ordered filament bundles based on the non-linear continuum elasticity theory of columnar materials. We show that twisted…
The best-understood crystal ordering transition is that of two-dimensional freezing, which proceeds by the rapid eradication of lattice defects as the temperature is lowered below a critical threshold. But crystals that assemble on closed…
We study the defect structure of crystalline particle arrays on negative Gaussian curvature capillary bridges with vanishing mean curvature (catenoids). The threshold aspect ratio for the appearance of isolated disclinations is found and…
Topological crystalline insulators (TCIs) can exhibit unique, quantized electric phenomena such as fractional electric polarization and boundary-localized fractional charge. This quantized fractional charge is the generic observable for…