Related papers: Functionality of disorder in muscle mechanics
The sliding friction force exerted by stochastic linkers interacting with a moving filament is calculated. The elastic properties of the substrate on which the linkers are anchored are shown to strongly influence the friction force. In some…
Force fluctuations exhibited in focal adhesions (FAs) that connect a cell to its extracellular environment, point to the complex role of the underlying machinery that controls cell migration. To elucidate the explicit role of myosin motors…
Cytoskeletal networks, which are essentially motor-filament assemblies, play a major role in many developmental processes involving structural remodeling and shape changes. These are achieved by nonequilibrium self-organization processes…
Self-assembly and force generation are two central processes in biological systems that usually are considered in separation. However, the signals that activate non-muscle myosin II molecular motors simultaneously lead to self-assembly into…
Hierarchically structured materials, which possess distinct features on different length scales, are ubiquitous in nature and engineering. In many cases, one structural level may be ordered while another structural level may be disordered.…
The cytoskeleton is an active composite of filamentous proteins that dictates diverse mechanical properties and processes in eukaryotic cells by generating forces and autonomously restructuring itself. Enzymatic motors that act on the…
The cooperative action of many molecular motors is essential for dynamic processes such as cell motility and mitosis. This action can be studied by using motility assays in which the motion of cytoskeletal filaments over a surface coated…
Living systems often exhibit internal driving: active, molecular processes drive nonequilibrium phenomena such as metabolism or migration. Active gels constitute a fascinating class of internally driven matter, where molecular motors exert…
The critical behavior of many physical systems involves two competing $n^{}_1-$ and $n^{}_2-$component order-parameters, ${\bf S}^{}_1$ and ${\bf S}^{}_2$, respectively, with $n=n^{}_1+n^{}_2$. Varying an external control parameter $g$,…
We have studied the elastic response of actin networks with both compliant and rigid crosslinks by modeling molecular motors as force dipoles. Our finite element simulations show that for compliant crosslinkers such as filamin A, the…
A living cell is an active environment where the organization and dynamics of chromatin are affected by different forms of activity. Optical experiments report that loci show subdiffusive dynamics and the chromatin fiber is seen to be…
Collagen forms the structural scaffold of connective tissues in all mammals. Tissues are remarkably resistant against mechanical deformations because collagen molecules hierarchically self-assemble in fibrous networks that stiffen with…
Microcrystals deform very differently from their macroscopic counterparts, displaying a size-dependent yield stress and intermittent plastic strain bursts. Here we demonstrate that size effects and strain bursts may be just two different…
Almost 60 years ago Andrew Huxley with his seminal paper \cite{Huxley1957} laid the foundation of modern muscle modeling, linking chemical events to mechanical performance. He described mechanics and energetics of muscle contraction through…
Living cells adapt and respond actively to the mechanical properties of their environment. In addition to biochemical mechanotransduction, evidence exists for a myosin-dependent, purely mechanical sensitivity to the stiffness of the…
Motor proteins drive persistent motion and self-organisation of cytoskeletal filaments. However, state-of-the-art microscopy techniques and continuum modelling approaches focus on large length and time scales. Here, we perform…
We study transport of interacting particles in weakly disordered media. Our one-dimensional system includes (i) disorder: the hopping rate governing the movement of a particle between two neighboring lattice sites is inhomogeneous, and (ii)…
Mechanical metamaterials made of flexible building blocks can exhibit a plethora of extreme mechanical responses, such as negative elastic constants, shape-changes, programmability and memory. To date, dissipation has largely remained…
The interplay between cytoskeletal architecture and the nonlinearity of the interactions due to bucklable filaments plays a key role in modulating the cell's mechanical stability and affecting its structural rearrangements. We study a model…
The ability of cells to reorganize in response to external stimuli is important in areas ranging from morphogenesis to tissue engineering. Elongated cells can co-align due to steric effects, forming states with local order. We show that…