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Live cells have ambiguous mechanical properties. They were often described as either elastic solids or viscoelastic fluids and have recently been classified as soft glassy materials characterized by weak power-law rheology. Nonlinear…
Here, we provide an overview of theoretical approaches to semiflexible polymers and their networks. Such semiflexible polymers have large bending rigidities that can compete with the entropic tendency of a chain to crumple up into a random…
Taking into account the nonequivalence of fixed-force and fixed-length ensembles in the weak-force regime, equations of state are derived that describe the equilibrium extension or compression of an ideal Gaussian polymer chain in response…
Polymers consisting of more than one type of monomer, known as copolymers, are vital to both living and synthetic systems. Copolymerisation has been studied theoretically in a number of contexts, often by considering a Markov process in…
The production of mechanical stresses in living organisms largely relies on localized, force-generating active units embedded in filamentous matrices. Numerical simulations of discrete fiber networks with fixed boundaries have shown that…
This paper presents a comprehensive computational framework for investigating thermo-elastic fracture in transversely isotropic materials, where classical linear elasticity fails to predict physically realistic behavior near stress…
Previous research on semiflexible polymers including cytoskeletal networks in cells has suggested the existence of distinct regimes of elastic response, in which the strain field is either uniform (affine) or non-uniform (non-affine) under…
In this study, we have utilized a molecular dynamics simulation approach to understand adhesion and friction behaviour of crosslinked polymer networks. We have used breakable quartic bond to model crosslinked polymers. We explored the…
We study a material modeled as a network of nodes connected by edges. Using a discrete approach, we build a nonlinear algebraic system that connects applied forces to internal forces and node positions. The model can describe elasticity,…
We have used kinetic Monte Carlo simulations to study the kinetics of unfolding of cross-linked polymer chains under mechanical loading. As the ends of a chain are pulled apart, the force transmitted by each crosslink increases until it…
In this paper we propose a nonlinear elasticity model of macromolecular conformational change (deformation) induced by electrostatic forces generated by an implicit solvation model. The Poisson-Boltzmann equation for the electrostatic…
Network models are used as efficient representation of materials with complex, interconnected locally one-dimensional structures. They typically accurately capture the mechanical properties of a material, while substantially reducing…
Understanding the structural complexity and predictability of complex networks is a central challenge in network science. Although recent studies have revealed a relationship between compression-based entropy and link prediction…
Over the past decade or two, the concept has emerged of using multiple types of weak interactions simultaneously to enhance the mechanical properties of elastomers. These weak interactions include physical entanglements, hydrogen bonds,…
Disordered networks of semiflexible filaments are common support structures in biology. Familiar examples include fibrous matrices in blood clots, bacterial biofilms, and essential components of cells and tissues of plants, animals, and…
The mechanics of single-chain stretching and rupture are central to understanding the resilience of biological polymers and designing strong and tough soft materials such as double-network gels and multi-network elastomers. In this work, we…
In this paper, we present a self-consistent field theory of macroscopic forces in spatially inhomogeneous flexible chain polyelectrolyte solutions. We derive an analytical expression for a stress tensor which consists of three terms:…
Many signalling functions in molecular biology require proteins bind to substrates such as DNA in response to environmental signals such as the simultaneous binding to a small molecule. Examples are repressor proteins which may transmit…
We study the relaxation dynamics of a coarse-grained polymer chain at different degrees of stretching by both analytical means and numerical simulations. The macromolecule is modelled as a string of beads, connected by anharmonic springs,…
Stretching an elastic material along one axis typically induces contraction along the transverse axes, a phenomenon known as the Poisson effect. From these strains, one can compute the specific volume, which generally either increases or,…