Related papers: Long ligands reinforce biological adhesion under s…
Living cells are characterized by the micrometric confinement of various macromolecules at high concentrations. Using droplets containing binary polymer blends as artificial cells, we previously showed that cell-sized confinement causes…
Nonlinear stiffening is a ubiquitous property of major types of biopolymers that make up the extracellular matrices (ECM) including collagen, fibrin and basement membrane. Within the ECM, many types of cells such as fibroblasts and cancer…
Understanding how biomechanical reorganization governs key biological processes, such as morphogenesis and development, requires predictive insights into stress distributions and cellular behavior. While traditional approaches focused on…
The shear rheology of dense colloidal and granular suspensions is strongly nonlinear, as these materials exhibit shear-thinning and shear-thickening, depending on multiple physical parameters. We numerically study the rheology of a simple…
The bending rigidity $k_c$ of bilayer vesicles self-assembled from amphiphilic diblock copolymers has been measured using single and dual-micropipet techniques. These copolymers are nearly a factor of 5 greater in hydrophobic membrane…
Animal morphogenesis involves complex tissue deformation processes, which require tight control over tissue rheology. Yet, it remains insufficiently understood how tissue rheology results from the interplay between cellular packing and…
In a mixed suspension of rods and small polymer coils, the rods adsorb onto a hard wall in contact with the suspension. This adsorption is studied in the low density of rods limit. It is driven by depletion forces and is much stronger for…
Via simulations of flowing foam, we connect the high and intermediate density regimes of complex fluid flows into a consistent microscopic picture of deformation. While at and above the jamming transition, elastic correlations lead to…
The behavior of cross-linking polymer solutions as they transition from liquid-like to solid-like material in flow determines success or failure in several applications. Dilute polymer solutions flow easily, while concentrated polymers or…
We use mesoscale simulations to gain insight into the digestion of biopolymers by studying the break-up dynamics of polymer aggregates (boluses) bound by physical cross-links. We investigate aggregate evolution, establishing that the…
Filamentous cyanobacteria, forming long strands of connected cells, are one of the earliest and most successful forms of life on Earth. They exhibit self-organised behaviour, forming large-scale patterns in structures like biomats and…
We examine the phase transition of polymer adsorption as well as the underlying kinetics of polymer binding from dilute solutions on a structureless solid surface. The emphasis is put on the properties of regular multiblock copolymers,…
Molecular adhesion plays a central role in many biological systems, yet existing methods to quantify adhesive strength often struggle to bridge the gap between single-molecule resolution and biologically relevant environments. Here, we…
The fast blood stream of animals is associated with large shear stresses. Consequently, blood cells have evolved a special morphology and a specific internal architecture allowing them to maintain their integrity over several weeks. For…
Biological tissues exhibit complex behaviors with their dynamics often resembling inert soft matter such as liquids, polymers, colloids, and liquid crystals. These analogies enable physics-based approaches for investigations of emergent…
We present a stochastic model which describes fronts of cells invading a wound. In the model cells can move, proliferate, and experience cell-cell adhesion. We find several qualitatively different regimes of front motion and analyze the…
Biopolymers are vital structures for many living organisms; for a variety of bacteria, adhesion polymers play a crucial role for the initiation of colonization. Some bacteria express, on their surface, attachment organelles (pili) that…
Cells and other soft particles are often forced to flow in confined geometries in both laboratory and natural environments, where the elastic deformation induces an additional drag and pressure drop across the particle. In contrast with…
The non-equilibrium structural and dynamical properties of a flexible polymer tethered to a reflecting wall and subject to oscillatory linear flow are studied by numerical simulations. Polymer is confined in two dimensions and is modeled as…
Fluids consisting of hard platelike particles near a hard wall are investigated using density functional theory. The density and orientational profiles as well as the surface tension and the excess coverage are determined and compared with…