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We investigate buckling of soft elastic capsules under negative pressure or for reduced capsule volume. Based on nonlinear shell theory and the assumption of a hyperelastic capsule membrane, shape equations for axisymmetric and initially…
A collection of thin structures buckle, bend, and bump into each-other when confined. This contact can lead to the formation of patterns: hair will self-organize in curls; DNA strands will layer into cell nuclei; paper, when crumpled, will…
There are many fields where it is of interest to measure the elastic moduli of tiny fragile fibers, such as filamentous bacteria, actin filaments, DNA, carbon nanotubes, and functional microfibers. The elastic modulus is typically deduced…
Buckling plays a critical role in the transport and dynamics of elastic microfilaments in Stokesian fluids. However, previous work has only considered filaments with homogeneous structural properties. Filament backbone stiffness can be…
Dynamic buckling is addressed for complete elastic spherical shells subject to a rapidly applied step in external pressure. Insights from the perspective of nonlinear dynamics reveal essential mathematical features of the buckling…
We study the elastic properties of soft solids containing air bubbles. Contrary to standard porous materials, the softness of the matrix allows for a coupling of the matrix elasticity to surface tension forces brought in by the bubbles.…
We study the wetting of a thin elastic filament floating on a fluid surface by a droplet of another, immiscible fluid. This quasi-2D experimental system is the lower-dimensional counterpart of the wetting and wrapping of a droplet by an…
Drying of biologically-relevant sessile droplets, including passive systems (like DNA and proteins), as well as active microbial systems comprising bacteria and algae, have garnered considerable attention over the last decades. Distinct…
Motivated by the buckling of glassy crusts formed on evaporating droplets of polymer and colloid solutions, we numerically model the deformation and buckling of spherical elastic caps controlled by varying the volume between the shell and…
In this paper, three-dimensional numerical simulations of ballooning in spiders using multiple silk threads are performed using the discrete elastic rods method. The ballooning of spiders is hypothesised to be caused by the presence of the…
Stick-slip motion, a common phenomenon observed during crawling of cells, is found to be strongly sensitive to the substrate stiffness. Stick-slip behaviours have previously been investigated typically using purely elastic substrates. For a…
We characterize the different morphologies adopted by a drop of liquid placed on two randomly oriented fibers, which is a first step toward understanding the wetting of fibrous networks. The present work reviews previous modeling for…
The tribology of a sliding elastic continuum in contact with a disordered substrate is investigated analytically and numerically via a bead-spring model. The deterministic dynamics of this system exhibits a depinning transition at a finite…
We investigate experimentally the behavior of self-propelled water-in-oil droplets, confined in capillaries of different square and circular cross-sections. The droplet's activity comes from the formation of swollen micelles at its…
When a flat elastic strip is compressed along its axis, it is bent in one of two possible directions via spontaneous symmetry breaking and forms a cylindrical arc, a phenomenon well known as Euler buckling. When this cylindrical section is…
We propose an approach to measure surface elastic constants of soft solids. Generally, this requires one to probe interfacial mechanics at around the elastocapillary length scale, which is typically microscopic. Deformations of microscopic…
Spider silk is a remarkable biomaterial with exceptional stiffness, strength, and toughness stemming from a unique microstructure. While recent studies show that silk fibers exhibit plasticity, hysteresis, and recovery under cyclic loading,…
A pinned-free beam in axial fluid flow, subjected to feedback-based actuation at the pinned end, is investigated. The actuation may be a moment or a prescribed angle and it is proportional to the state (curvature, slope, or displacement) of…
The nonlinear mechanics of a flexible elastic rod constrained at its edges by a pair of sliding sleeves is analyzed. The planar equilibrium configurations of this variable-length elastica are found to have shape defined only by the…
An important class of fluid-structure problems involve the dynamics of ordered arrays of immersed, flexible fibers. While specialized numerical methods have been developed to study fluid-fiber systems, they become infeasible when there are…