Related papers: Phase transitions in biological membranes
How do cells tune emergent properties at the scale of tissues? One class of such emergent behaviors are rigidity transitions, in which a tissue changes from a solid-like to a fluid-like state or vice versa. Here, we introduce a new way for…
Communication between cells is realized by exchange of biochemical substances. Due to internal organization of living systems and variability of external parameters, the exchange is heavily influenced by perturbations of various parameters…
Lipid membranes are abundant in living organisms, where they constitute a surrounding shell for cells and their organelles. There are many circumstances in which the deformations of lipid membranes are involved in living cells: fusion and…
The premelting of ice is well known, but little is known about how the premelted and solid surfaces convert to each other. In this work, the transition dynamics between two phases are revealed with large-scale molecular dynamics…
The mechanics of crawling cells on a substrate is investigated by using a minimal model that satisfies the force-free condition. A cell is described by two subcellular elements connected by a linear actuator that changes the length of the…
The phase diagram of a stack of tensionless membranes with nonlinear curvature energy and vertical harmonic interaction is calculated exactly in a large number of dimensions of configuration space. At low temperatures, the system forms a…
Thermal fluctuations are important for amphiphilic bilayer membranes since typical bending stiffnesses can be a few $k_B T$. The rod-like constituent molecules are generically tilted with respect to the local normal for packing reasons. We…
Membrane proteins are crucial in regulating biomembrane shapes and controlling the dynamic changes in membrane morphology during essential cellular processes. These proteins can localize to regions with their preferred curvatures (curvature…
Biological cells can actively tune their intracellular architecture according to their overall shape. Here we explore the rheological implication of such coupling in a minimal model of a dense cellular material where each cell exerts an…
Photothermal therapies are based on the optical excitation of plasmonic nanoparticles in the biological environment. The effects of the irradiation on the biological medium depend critically on the heat transfer process at the nanoparticle…
Quantum phase transitions are central to our understanding of why matter at very low temperatures can exhibit starkly different properties upon small changes of microscopic parameters. Accurately locating those transitions is challenging…
The most important recent results in the theory of phase transitions and quantum effects in quantum anharmonic crystals are presented and discussed. In particular, necessary and sufficient conditions for a phase transition to occur at some…
Boiling is the out-of-equilibrium transition which occurs when a liquid is heated above its vaporization temperature. At the nanoscale, boiling may be triggered by irradiated nanoparticles immersed in water or nanocomposite surfaces and…
Peripheral membrane proteins can reversibly and specifically bind to biological membranes to carry out functions such as cell signalling, enzymatic activity, or membrane remodelling. Structures of these proteins and of their lipid-binding…
The initiation of directional cell motion requires symmetry breaking that can happen both with or without external stimuli. During cell crawling, forces generated by the cytoskeleton and their transmission through mechanosensitive adhesions…
The action potential is widely considered a purely electrical phenomenon. However, one also finds mechanical and thermal changes that can be observed experimentally. In particular, nerve membranes become thicker and axons contract. The…
Uncovering the rules governing the nonequilibrium dynamics of the membranes that define biological cells is of central importance to understanding the physics of living systems. We theoretically and computationally investigate the behavior…
Lipid structures exhibit complex and highly dynamic lateral structure; and changes in lipid density and fluidity are believed to play an essential role in membrane targeting and function. The dynamic structure of liquids on the molecular…
Real-life bacteria often swim in complex fluids, but our understanding of the interactions between bacteria and complex surroundings is still evolving. In this work, rod-like \textit{Bacillus subtilis} swims in a quasi-2D environment with…
The thermodynamic aspects of the polymorphic phase transition from {\alpha}-indomethacin to {\gamma}-indomethacin are the fundamental key to find the most bioavailable phase of indomethacin. In the present work, varying the temperature and…