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The fracture and severing of polymer chains plays a critical role in the failure of fibrous materials and the regulated turnover of intracellular filaments. Using continuum wormlike chain models, we investigate the fracture of semiflexible…
In this paper, we explore the reduction of functionality in a complex system as a consequence of cumulative random damage and imperfect reparation, a phenomenon modeled as a dynamical process on networks. We analyze the global…
Motivated by the organization of crosslinked cytoskeletal biopolymers, we present a semimicroscopic replica field theory for the formation of anisotropic random networks of semiflexible polymers. The networks are formed by introducing…
Contractile biopolymer networks, such as the actomyosin meshwork of animal cells, are ubiquitous in living organisms. The active gel theory, which provides the thermodynamic framework for these materials, has been mostly used in conjunction…
This paper develops a damage model for unfilled cross-linked rubbers based on the concept of scission of polymer chains. The model is built up on the well-known Gent elastic potential complemented by a kinetic equation describing effects of…
Thixotropic yields stress fluids are complex materials such as paint, drilling mud, and food products like ketchup or yogurt. They behave as a solid below a certain shear stress (called yield stress), and flows as a liquid above it. The…
This paper develops a damage model for unfilled cross-linked rubbers based on the concept of scission of polymer chains. The model is built up on the well-known Gent elastic potential complemented by a kinetic equation describing effects of…
Tire wear releases millions of tons of particles annually, bearing immense industrial and environmental impact. However, efforts to mitigate the wear of elastomeric materials remain largely empirical, due to a limited understanding of the…
Since their discovery in 2011, vitrimers - covalent associative network polymers - have challenged the traditional understanding of soft matter relaxation dynamics: unlike in typical glass-forming liquids, vitrimers' viscous relaxation can…
Biological networks have evolved to be highly functional within uncertain environments while remaining extremely adaptable. One of the main contributors to the robustness and evolvability of biological networks is believed to be their…
In active materials, uncoordinated internal stresses lead to emergent long-range flows. An understanding of how the behavior of active materials depends on mesoscopic (hydrodynamic) parameters is developing, but there remains a gap in…
In this paper we explore the evolution of transport capacity on networks with stochastic incidence of damage and accumulation of faults in their connections. For each damaged configuration of the network, we analyze a Markovian random…
Fracture resistance of blood clots plays a crucial role in physiological hemostasis and pathological thromboembolism. Although recent experimental and computational studies uncovered the poro-viscoelastic property of blood clots and its…
Recently developed linker-mediated vitrimers based on metathesis of dioxaborolanes with various commercially available polymers have shown both good processability and outstanding performance, such as mechanical, thermal, and chemical…
Motivated by recent experiments showing that stiff biopolymer gels exhibit highly unusual negative normal elastic stresses, we develop a computational model for stiff polymer networks subject to large strains. In all cases, we find that…
Vitrimers offer a promising sustainable alternative to conventional epoxies due to their recyclability. Vitrimers are covalent adaptive networks where some bonds can break and reform above the vitrimer transition temperature. While this can…
The mechanical properties of the cell depend crucially on the tension of its cytoskeleton, a biopolymer network that is put under stress by active motor proteins. While the fibrous nature of the network is known to strongly affect the…
Borosilicones (e.g., Silly Putty) have been known for 70 years, but their peculiar behaviors have remain unexplained. In this work, experiment and theory are used to show that they are network liquids---dynamic macromolecules that appear…
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.…
Biological systems have the unique ability to self-organize and generate autonomous motion and work. Motivated by this, we investigate a 2D model colloidal network that can repeatedly transition between disordered states of low connectivity…