Related papers: Structuring Stress for Active Materials Control

Many organisms leverage an interplay between shape and activity to generate motion and adapt to their environment. Embedding such feedback into synthetic microrobots could eliminate the need for sensors, software, and actuators, yet current…

Active forces occurring within cells can drive crucial biological processes that involve spontaneous organization and shape change, such as cell division. Motivated by recent in vitro experiments of nematic droplets of cytoskeletal…

From cytoskeletal networks to tissues, many biological systems behave as active materials. Their composition and stress-generation is affected by chemical reaction networks. In such systems, the coupling between mechanics and chemistry…

The cytoskeleton is an active composite of filamentous proteins that dictates diverse mechanical properties and processes in eukaryotic cells by generating forces and autonomously restructuring itself. Enzymatic motors that act on the…

The emergence of macroscopic order and patterns is a central paradigm in systems of (self-)propelled agents, and a key component in the structuring of many biological systems.The relationships between the ordering process and the underlying…

One characteristic feature of soft matter systems is their strong response to external stimuli. As a consequence they are comparatively easily driven out of their ground state and out of equilibrium, which leads to many of their fascinating…

Cells and tissues exert forces and can actively change shape. This strikingly autonomous behavior is powered by the cytoskeleton, which includes an active gel of actin filaments, crosslinks, and myosin molecular motors. Although individual…

In this paper, we develop and analyze a minimal model for a 2D network of cross-linked actin filaments and myosin motors, representing the cortical cytoskeleton of eukaryotic cells. We implement coarse-grained representations of force…

Active materials with distinctive nonequilibrium properties have diverse materials science applications. Active systems are common in living matter, such as the filament network in the cell that is activated by molecular motors, and in…

Biological systems often involve the self-assembly of basic components into complex and function- ing structures. Artificial systems that mimic such processes can provide a well-controlled setting to explore the principles involved and also…

In contrast with ordinary materials, living matter drives its own motion by generating active, out-of-equilibrium internal stresses. These stresses typically originate from localized active elements embedded in an elastic medium, such as…

Many structural properties of conventional passive materials are known to arise from the symmetries of their microscopic constituents. By contrast, it is largely unclear how the interplay between cell shape and self-propulsion controls the…

We investigate the turbulent dynamics of a two-dimensional active nematic liquid crystal con- strained on a curved surface. Using a combination of hydrodynamic and particle-based simulations, we demonstrate that the fundamental structural…

Active particles contain internal degrees of freedom with the ability to take in and dissipate energy and, in the process, execute systematic movement. Examples include all living organisms and their motile constituents such as molecular…

Essentially all biology is active and dynamic. Biological entities autonomously sense, com- pute, and respond using energy-coupled ratchets that can produce force and do work. The cytoskeleton, along with its associated proteins and motors,…

Cell crawling crucially depends on the collective dynamics of the acto-myosin cytoskeleton. However, it remains an open question to what extent cell polarization and persistent motion depend on continuous regulatory mechanisms and…

One objective of active matter science is to unveil principles by which chaotic microscale dynamics could be transformed into useful work. A nematic liquid crystal environment offers a number of possibilities, one of which is a directional…

Active networks made of biopolymers and motor proteins are valuable bioinspired systems that have been used in the last decades to study the cytoskeleton and its self-organization under mechanical stimulation. Different techniques are…

Internal activity can fundamentally reshape the mechanical behavior of solids, yet its role in softening and failure remains incompletely understood. In this study, we investigate spontaneous deformations in activated solids via non-affine…

Active matter locally converts chemical energy into mechanical work and, for this reason, it provides new mechanisms of pattern formation. In particular, active gels made of protein motors and filaments are far-from-equilibrium systems that…