Related papers: Wrinkling instability in 3D active nematics
Actin is a key component of the cytoskeleton, which plays central roles in cell motility, division, growth, and tensile strength. To enable this wide range of transient mechanical processes and properties, networks of actin filaments…
Active nematics are materials composed of mobile, elongated particles that can transform energy from the environment into a mechanical motion. Current experimental realizations of the active nematics are of biological origin and include…
Cells accomplish diverse functions using the same molecular building blocks, from setting up cytoplasmic flows to generating mechanical forces. In particular, transitions between these non-equilibrium states are triggered by regulating the…
Macromolecules can gain special properties by adopting knotted conformations, but engineering knotted macromolecules is a challenging task. Here we surprisingly observed that knotting can be very effectively produced in active polymers.…
Active nematics contain topological defects which under sufficient activity move, create and annihilate in a chaotic quasi-steady state, called active turbulence. However, understanding active defects under confinement is an open challenge,…
In this work we study the assisted translocation of a polymer across a membrane nanopore, inside which a molecular motor exerts a force fuelled by the hydrolysis of ATP molecules. In our model the motor switches to its active state for a…
Growing tissue and bacterial colonies are active matter systems where cell divisions and cellular motion generate active stress. Although they operate in the non-equilibrium regime, these biological systems can form large-scale ordered…
Dense, active systems show active turbulence, a state characterised by flow fields that are chaotic, with continually changing velocity jets and swirls. Here we review our current understanding of active turbulence. The development is…
Robust self-organization of subcellular structures is a key principle governing the dynamics and evolution of cellular life. In fission yeast cells undergoing division, the mitotic spindle spontaneously emerges from the interaction of…
Active gels made of cytoskeletal proteins are valuable materials with attractive non-equilibrium properties such as spatial self-organization and self-propulsion. At least four typical routes to spatial patterning have been reported to date…
The origin of biological motion can be traced back to the function of molecular motor proteins. Cytoplasmic dynein and kinesin transport organelles within our cells moving along a polymeric filament, the microtubule. The motion of the…
Active filaments, such as microtubules with attached cargo-carrying motor proteins, are important dynamic structures for fluid transport in and around living cells. The mathematical models of active filaments appearing in the literature…
The mammalian cell membrane is embedded with biomolecular condensates of protein and lipid clusters, which interact with an underlying viscoelastic cytoskeleton network to organize the cell surface and mechanically interact with the…
Spontaneous growth of long-wavelength deformations is a defining feature of active fluids with orientational order. We investigate the effect of biaxial rectangular confinement on the instability of initially shear-aligned 3D isotropic…
Active stresses, which are collectively generated by the motion of energy-consuming rod-like constituents, generate chaotic autonomous flows. Controlling active stresses in space and time is an essential prerequisite for controlling the…
Reconstituted filamentous actin networks with myosin motor proteins form active gels, in which motor proteins generate forces that drive the network far from equilibrium. This motor activity can also strongly affect the network elasticity;…
During the early developmental process of organisms, the formation of the left-right laterality requires a subtle mechanism, as it is associated with other principal body axes. Any inherent chiral feature in an egg cell can in principal…
Nematic elastomers are rubbery solids which have liquid crystals incorporated into their polymer chains. These materials display many unusual mechanical properties, one such being the ability to form fine-scale microstructure. In this work,…
The formation, maintenance and reorganization of the cytoskeletal filament network is essential for a number of cellular processes. While the crucial role played by active forces generated by motor proteins has been studied extensively,…
Dynamical clustering represents a characteristic feature of active matter consisting of self-propelled agents that convert energy from the environment into mechanical motion. At the micron scale, typical of overdamped dynamics, particles…