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Polymerization and formation of crosslinked polymer networks are important processes in manufacturing, materials fabrication, and in the case of hydrated polymer networks, synthesis of biomedical materials, drug delivery, and tissue…
We have implemented a complex network description for metallic glasses, able to predict the elasto-plastic regime, the location of shear bands and the statistics that controls the plastic events that originate in the material due to a…
Reversible crosslinking is a design paradigm for polymeric materials, wherein they are microscopically reinforced with chemical species that form transient crosslinks between the polymer chains. Besides the potential for self-healing,…
Polymer chains decorated with a fraction of monomers capable of forming reversible bonds form transient polymer networks that are important in soft and biological systems. If chains are flexible and the attractive monomers are all of the…
Although the behavior of entangled polymers in startup shear flows with constant shear rates has been thoroughly investigated, the response under creep has not been frequently considered. In this study, primitive chain network simulations,…
We propose a theoretical framework for dealing with a transient polymer network undergoing small deformations, based on the rate of breaking and re-forming of network crosslinks and the evolving elastic reference state. In this framework,…
Multiple polymer networks, such as double-network elastomers comprising a sacrificial and a matrix network, exhibit exceptional mechanical resilience, commonly attributed to the formation of an extended damage zone before a crack can grow.…
Highly nonconvex granular particles, such as staples and metal shavings, can form solid-like cohesive structures through geometric entanglement (interlocking). The network structure formed by this entanglement, however, remains largely…
The two approaches to analyzing the large strain behavior of rubbery networks are phenomenologically, using strain energy functions drawn from continuum mechanics, and molecular models, which apply statistical mechanics to compute the…
We investigate the crystallization of crosslinked and entangled polymers under external deformation using a coarse-grained poly(vinyl alcohol) (CG-PVA) model and molecular dynamics simulations. Following uniaxial deformation, the systems…
The study of networks plays a crucial role in investigating the structure, dynamics, and function of a wide variety of complex systems in myriad disciplines. Despite the success of traditional network analysis, standard networks provide a…
In this thesis the formation and properties of a polymer gel on and at a surface are investigated. The gel under investigation is defined as a three-dimensional network of "phantom" macromolecules that form permanent links with one another…
We investigate the static and dynamic properties of dendrimers diffusing through a network of linear associative polymers using coarse-grained Brownian dynamics simulations. Both dendrimers and network chains are modelled as bead-spring…
The mechanical properties of a polymeric network containing both crosslinks and sliplinks (entanglements) are studied using a multi-chain Brownian dynamics simulation. We coarse-grain at the level of chain segments connecting consecutive…
In this study, a versatile methodology for initiating polymerization from monomers in highly cross-linked materials is investigated. As polymerization progresses, force-field parameters undergo continuous modification due to the formation…
The classical rheological theories of entangled polymeric liquids are built upon two pillars: Gaussian statistics of entanglement strands and the assumption that the stress arises exclusively from the change of intramolecular configuration…
An assumption in micromechanical analysis of polymers is that the constitutive polymeric media is non-porous. Non-porosity of media, however, is merely a simplifying assumption. In this paper, we neglect this assumption and studied polymer…
The transport of deformable particles through porous media underlies a wealth of applications ranging from filtration to oil recovery to the transport and spreading of biological agents. Using direct numerical simulations, we analyze the…
We analyze van der Waals interactions between two rigid polymers with sequence-specific, anisotropic polarizabilities along the polymer backbones, so that the dipole moments fluctuate parallel to the polymer backbones. Assuming that each…
Nonlinear extensional flows are common in polymer processing but remain challenging theoretically because dramatic stretching of chains deforms the entanglement network far from equilibrium. Here, we present coarse-grained simulations of…