Related papers: Physics of Active Emulsions
The activity of biological cells is primarily based on chemical reactions and typically modeled as a reaction-diffusion system. Cells are, however, highly crowded with macromolecules, including a variety of molecular machines such as…
We study water-in-oil emulsion droplets, running the Belousov-Zhabotinsky reaction, that form a new type of active matter unit. These droplets, stabilised by surfactants dispersed in the oil medium, are capable of internal chemical…
Dense active systems are widespread in nature, examples range from bacterial colonies to biological tissues. Dense clusters of active particles can be obtained by increasing the packing fraction of the system or taking advantage of a…
We use state-of-the-art molecular dynamics simulations to study hydrodynamic effects on aging during kinetics of phase separation in a fluid mixture. The domain growth law shows a crossover from a diffusive regime to a viscous hydrodynamic…
In the presence of a chemically active particle, a nearby chemically inert particle can respond to a concentration gradient and move by diffusiophoresis. The nature of the motion is studied for two cases: first, a fixed reactive sphere and…
Chemical processes in closed systems are poorly controllable since they always relax to equilibrium. Living systems avoid this fate and give rise to a much richer diversity of phenomena by operating under nonequilibrium conditions. Recent…
Unlike fluids at thermal equilibrium, biomolecular mixtures in living systems can sustain nonequilibrium steady states, in which active processes modify the conformational states of the constituent molecules. Despite qualitative…
Chemically active colloids or enzymes cluster into dense droplets driven by their phoretic response to collectively generated chemical gradients. Employing Brownian dynamics simulation techniques, our study of the dynamics of such a…
Living and engineered systems rely on the stable coexistence of two interspersed liquid phases. Yet surface tension drives their complete separation. Here we show that stable droplets of uniform and tuneable size can be produced through…
Droplet interface bilayers are a convenient model system to study the physio-chemical properties of phospholipid bilayers, the major component of the cell membrane. The mechanical response of these bilayers to various external mechanical…
Biological cells exhibit a hierarchical spatial organization, where various compartments harbor condensates that form by phase separation. Cells can control the emergence of these condensates by affecting compartment size, the amount of the…
Active colloids constitute a novel class of materials composed of colloidal-scale particles locally converting chemical energy into motility, mimicking micro-organisms. Evolving far from equilibrium, these systems display structural…
Active drops refer to drops with the ability to self-migrate: these drops typically attain this ability by virtue of containing of active particles that derive energy from their environment and undergo directed motion inside the drops,…
We construct a mathematical model for a diffusiophoretic motion of a deformable droplet, which is floating on a liquid surface and is driven by the surface tension gradient originating from the surface concentration field of the chemicals…
The formation of dynamical patterns is one of the most striking features of nonequilibrium physical systems. Recent work has shown that such patterns arise generically from forces that violate Newton's third law, known as nonreciprocal…
Active phase separations evade canonical thermodynamic descriptions and have thus challenged our understanding of coexistence and interfacial phenomena. Considerable progress has been made towards a non-equilibrium theoretical description…
The homeostasis of epithelial tissue relies on a balance between the self-renewal of stem cell populations, cellular differentiation, and loss. Although this balance needs to be tightly regulated to avoid pathologies, such as tumor growth,…
The persistent motility of the individual constituents in microbial suspensions represents a prime example of so-called active matter systems. Cells consume energy, exert forces and move, overall releasing the constraints of equilibrium…
Living systems are capable of locomotion, reconfiguration, and replication. To perform these tasks, cells spatiotemporally coordinate the interactions of force-generating, "active" molecules that create and manipulate non-equilibrium…
Cell-cell contacts in tissues are continuously subject to mechanical forces due to homeostatic pressure and active cytoskeleton dynamics. While much is known about the molecular pathways of adhesion, the role of mechanics is less well…