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Failure of amorphous materials is characterized by the emergence of dissipation. The connection between particle dynamics, dissipation, and overall material rheology, however, has still not been elucidated. Here, we take a new approach…
We study the high-velocity regime mode-I fracture instability when small microbranches start to appear near the main crack, using large scale simulations. Some of the features of those microbranches have been reproduced qualitatively in…
The effects of purely elastic collisions on the dynamics of heavy inertial particles is investigated in a three-dimensional random incompressible flow. It is shown that the statistical properties of inter-particle separations and relative…
We present a coarse-grained lattice model to study the influence of water on the recognition process of two rigid proteins. The basic model is formulated in terms of the hydrophobic effect. We then investigate several modifications of our…
The accumulation of self-propelled particles on repulsive barriers is a widely observed feature in active matter. Despite being implicated in a broad range of biological processes, from biofilm formation to cytoskeletal movement, wetting of…
Froth flotation predominantly separates particles according to their differences in wettability. However, other particle properties such as size, shape or density significantly influence the separation outcome as well. Froth flotation is…
Lipid bilayer membranes have a native (albeit small) permeability for water molecules. Under an external load, provided that the bilayer structure stays intact and does not suffer from poration or rupture, a lipid membrane deforms and its…
Understanding how pore structure influences flow and transport behaviour in granular materials is essential for addressing a wide range of geotechnical, hydraulic, and environmental challenges. These processes are largely shaped by the…
The influence on macroscopic work hardening of small, spherical, elastic particles dispersed within a matrix is studied using an isotropic strain gradient plasticity framework. An analytical solution, based on a recently developed yield…
Multi-phase materials are key for modern engineering applications. They are generally characterized by a high strength and ductility. Many of these materials fail by ductile fracture of the, generally softer, matrix phase. In this work we…
Using molecular dynamics simulation, we study structural and dynamical heterogeneities at melting in two-dimensional one-component systems with 36000 particles. Between crystal and liquid we find intermediate hexatic states, where the…
Many amorphous glassy materials exhibit complex spatio-temporal mechanical response and rheology, characterized by an intermittent stress-strain response and a fluctuating velocity profile. Under quasistatic and athermal deformation…
We wish to understand the macroscopic plastic behaviour of metals by upscaling the micro-mechanics of dislocations. We consider a highly simplified dislocation network, which allows our microscopic model to be a one dimensional particle…
Mesh-like structures, such as mucus gel or cytoskeleton networks, are ubiquitous in biological systems. These intricate structures are composed of cross-linked, semi-flexible bio-filaments, crucial to numerous biological processes. In many…
It is widely known that hydrogels, a class of soft materials made of a polymer chain network, are prone to fatigue failure. To understand the underlying mechanism, here we simulate polymer scission and fatigue initiation in the vicinity of…
Experiments on quasistatic crack propagation in gelatin hydrogels reveal a new branching instability triggered by wetting the tip opening with a drop of aqueous solvent less viscous than the bulk one. We show that the emergence of unstable…
Dense, stabilized, frictional particulate suspensions in a viscous liquid undergo increasingly strong continuous shear thickening (CST) as the solid packing fraction, $\phi$, increases above a critical volume fraction, and discontinuous…
A characteristic property of many soft matter systems is an ultrasoft effective interaction between their structural units. This softness often leads to complex behavior. In particular, ultrasoft systems under pressure demonstrate…
The behavior of microgels near surfaces and their adsorption is studied by simple scaling theory. Two different types of microgels can be studied, i.e., fractal type microgels and randomly crosslinked polymer chains. In the first case the…
We study the permeability and selectivity (`permselectivity') of model membranes made of polydisperse polymer networks for molecular penetrant transport, using coarse-grained, implicit-solvent computer simulations. The permeability…