Related papers: Interplay of Structure, Elasticity and Dynamics in…
We study avenues to shape multistability and shape-morphing in flexible crystalline membranes of cylindrical topology, enabled by glide mobility of dislocations. Using computational modeling, we obtain states of mechanical equilibrium…
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…
With exquisite precision and reproducibility, cells orchestrate the cooperative action of thousands of nanometer-sized molecular motors to carry out mechanical tasks at much larger length scales, such as cell motility, division and…
In this article, the fluid-rigid body interaction problem of nematic liquid crystals described by the general Beris-Edwards $Q$-tensor model is studied. It is proved first that the total energy of this problem decreases in time. The…
We use molecular dynamics to study the ordering of a nematic liquid crystal around a spherical particle or droplet. Homeotropic boundary conditions and strong anchoring create a hedgehog director configuration on the particle surface and in…
A paradigm for internally driven matter is the active nematic liquid crystal, whereby the equations of a conventional nematic are supplemented by a minimal active stress that violates time reversal symmetry. In practice, active fluids may…
We establish the Statistical Mechanics framework for a bundle of Nf living and uncrosslinked actin filaments in a supercritical solution of free monomers pressing against a mobile wall. The filaments are anchored normally to a fixed planar…
Recent numerical studies have identified the persistence time of active motion as a critical parameter governing glassy dynamics in dense active matter. Here we studied dynamics in liquids of granular active ellipsoids with tunable…
Mixing colloid shapes with distinctly different anisotropy generates composite nematics in which the order of the individual components can be fundamentally different. In colloidal rod-disk mixtures or hybrid nematics composed of…
A promising approach in designing composite materials with unusual physical behavior combines solid nanostructures and orientationally ordered soft matter at the mesoscale. Such composites not only inherit properties of their constituents…
From the theory of topological defect formation proposed for the early universe, the so called Kibble mechanism, it follows that the density correlation functions of defects and anti-defects in a given system should be completely determined…
We develop a molecular model of non-uniform deformations within the framework of liquid crystal rubber elasticity. We show that, similarly to the uniform case, the theory is not sensitive to the molecular details of polymer liquid crystal…
The translation and shape deformations of a passive viscous Newtonian droplet immersed in an active nematic liquid crystal under circular confinement are analyzed using a linear stability analysis. We focus on the case of a sharply aligned…
Active nematics are the nonequilibrium analog of passive liquid crystals in which anisotropic units consume free energy to drive emergent behavior. Similar to liquid crystal (LC) molecules in displays, ordering and dynamics in active…
The physical gelation of colloids produces elastic structures that are commonly used to stabilize complex fluids in multiple industries. However, the ability to control the level of elastic modulus of these materials is limited by the…
Thin elastic films can spontaneously attach to liquid interfaces, offering a platform for tailoring their physical, chemical, and optical properties. Current understanding of the elastocapillarity of thin films is based primarily on studies…
Liquid crystal elastomers are rubbers with liquid crystal order. They contract along their nematic director when heated or illuminated. The shape changes are large and occur in a relatively narrow temperature interval, or at low…
The actin cytoskeleton is a semiflexible biopolymer network whose morphology is controlled by a wide range of biochemical and physical factors. Actin is known to undergo a phase transition from a single-filament state to a bundled state by…
We demonstrate several examples of driving and steering of colloids when dispersed in nematic liquid crystals. The driving mechanism is based on the principle of nonlinear electrophoresis which is mediated by the asymmetry in the structure…
Nematic liquid crystal (LC) molecules adsorbed on two dimensional materials are aligned along the crystal directions of the hexagonal lattice. It was demonstrated that short electric pulses can reorient the aligned LC molecules in the…