Related papers: Transient instabilities in swelling dynamics
Swelling is a volumetric-growth process in which a porous material expands by spontaneous imbibition of additional pore fluid. Swelling is distinct from other growth processes in that it is inherently poromechanical: Local expansion of the…
Hydrogel coatings absorb water vapor - or other solvents - and, as such, are good candidates for antifog applications. In the present study, the transfer of vapor from the atmosphere to hydrogel thin films is measured in a situation where…
Liquid migration in active soft solids is a very common phenomenon in Nature at different scales: from cells to leaves. It can be caused by mechanical as well as chemical actions. The work focuses on the migration of liquid provoked by…
Subjected to compressive stresses, soft polymers with stiffness gradients can display various buckling patterns. These compressive stresses can have different origins, like mechanical forces, temperature changes, or, for hydrogel materials,…
Hydrogels have had a profound impact in the fields of tissue engineering, drug delivery, and materials science as a whole. Due to the network architecture of these materials, imbibement with water often results in uniform swelling and…
Soft membranes are commonly employed in shape-morphing applications, where the material is programmed to achieve a target shape upon activation by an external trigger, and as coating layers that alter the surface characteristics of bulk…
Biomolecules, such as proteins and RNAs, can phase separate in the cytoplasm of cells to form biomolecular condensates. Such condensates are liquid-like droplets that can wet biological surfaces such as membranes. Many molecules that…
Wetting transitions have been predicted and observed to occur for various combinations of fluids and surfaces. This paper describes the origin of such transitions, for liquid films on solid surfaces, in terms of the gas-surface interaction…
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…
We compute the rheological properties of inelastic hard spheres in steady shear flow for general shear rates and densities. Starting from the microscopic dynamics we generalise the Integration Through Transients (\textsc{itt}) formalism to…
In this paper we propose several models that describe the dynamics of liquid films which are covered by a high concentration layer of insoluble surfactant. First, we briefly review the 'classical' hydrodynamic form of the coupled evolution…
Polymer brush layers are responsive materials that swell in contact with good solvents and their vapors. We deposit drops of an almost completely wetting volatile oil onto an oleophilic polymer brush layer and follow the response of the…
Poroelastic materials, consisting of a permeable solid matrix infiltrated with fluid, are ubiquitous in natural and engineering contexts. In poroelastic polymer solids, the elastic matrix swells to equilibrium when immersed in a solvent…
From biological tissues to layers of paint, macroscopic non-porous materials with the capacity to swell when brought in contact with an appropriate solvent are ubiquitous. Here, we study experimentally and theoretically one of the…
Water vapor capture through free surface flows plays a crucial role in various industrial applications, such as liquid desiccant air conditioning systems, water harvesting, and dewatering. This paper studies the dynamics of a silicone…
Surface creasing in swelling polymer gels is commonly attributed to compressive strain or interlayer mismatch, yet its general control remains unclear. Here we show that solvent polymerization degree $N_{\rm s}$ provides an independent…
The structure and stability of the convective flow generated by a source located at the water surface containing an insoluble surfactant layer are experimentally investigated. Application of a few types of source, which differ in the force…
The article demonstrates that the internal circulation velocity and patterns in sessile droplets on superhydrophobic surfaces is governed by the surface curvature. Particle Image Velocimetry reveals that increasing convexity deteriorates…
We investigate stresses and particle motion during the start up of flow in a colloidal dispersion close to arrest into a glassy state. A combination of molecular dynamics simulation, mode coupling theory and confocal microscopy experiment…
We investigate pattern transformations of periodic hydrogel systems that are triggered by swelling-induced structural instabilities. The types of microstructures considered in the present work include single-phase and two-phase voided…