Related papers: Renormalization of elastic quadrupoles in amorphou…

We use three-dimensional phase-field simulations to investigate the dynamics of the two-phase composite patterns formed upon during solidification of eutectic alloys. Besides the spatially periodic lamellar and rod patterns that have been…

We extend the model of a 2$d$ solid to include a line of defects. Neighboring atoms on the defect line are connected by ?springs? of different strength and different cohesive energy with respect to the rest of the system. Using the…

Bead spring models for polymers in solution are nonlinear if either the finite extensibility of the polymer, excluded volume effects or hydrodynamic interactions between polymer segments are taken into account. For such models we use a…

Plastic yield of amorphous solids occurs by power law distributed slip avalanches whose universality is still debated. Determination of the power law exponents from experiments and molecular dynamics simulations is hampered by limited…

Using the contemporary thermodynamic equations of elastic solids leads to contradictions with the fundamental statements of thermodynamics. Two examples are presented to expose the inconsistencies. In example one the internal energy between…

Active-elastic instabilities are common phenomena in the natural world which have the aspect of sudden mechanical morphings. Frequently, the driving force of the instability mechanisms has a chemo-mechanical nature which makes these kind of…

We combine an analytically solvable mean-field elasto-plastic model with molecular dynamics simulations of a generic glass-former to demonstrate that, depending on their preparation protocol, amorphous materials can yield in two…

Space-filling assemblies of athermal hydrophobic particles floating at an air-water interface, called particle rafts, are shown to undergo an unusual phase transition between two i.e., a low density `less-rigid and a high density…

We use theory and simulations to investigate the existence of amorphous glassy states in ultrasoft colloids. We combine the hyper-netted chain approximation with mode-coupling theory to study the dynamic phase diagram of soft repulsive…

A re-entrant gas-liquid spinodal was proposed as a possible explanation of the apparent divergence of the compressibility and specific heat on supercooling water. Such a counter intuitive possibility, e.g. a liquid that becomes unstable to…

We present the general theory of Ising transitions in isotropic elastic media with vanishing thermal expansion. By constructing a minimal model with appropriate spin-lattice couplings, we show that in two dimensions near a continuous…

We discuss the microscopic mechanisms by which low-temperature amorphous states, such as ultrastable glasses, transform into equilibrium fluids, after a sudden temperature increase. Experiments suggest that this process is similar to the…

When submitted to large stresses at high temperature, usual crystals may irreversibly deform. This phenomenon is known as plasticity and it is due to the motion of crystal defects such as dislocations. We have discovered that, in the…

We show that the vibrational response of a glassy liquid at finite frequencies can be described by continuum mechanics despite the vast degeneracy of the vibrational ground state; standard continuum elasticity assumes a unique ground state.…

The sliding columnar phase is a new liquid-crystalline phase of matter composed of two-dimensional smectic lattices stacked one on top of the other. This phase is characterized by strong orientational but weak positional correlations…

The origin of recently observed spontaneous chiral symmetry breaking in polar fluids is an unsolved problem, and poses fundamental questions as to how heliconical structures emerge in systems composed of achiral molecules. We report on the…

In many interesting physical settings, such as the vulcanization of rubber, the introduction of permanent random constraints between the constituents of a homogeneous fluid can cause a phase transition to a random solid state. In this…

The last decade has seen major progresses in studies of elementary mechanisms of deformation in amorphous materials. Here, we start with a review of physically-based theories of plasticity, going back to the identification of…

A polycrystalline solid is modelled as an ensemble of random irregular polyhedra filling the entire space occupied by the solid body, leaving no voids or flaws between them. Adjacent grains can slide with a relative velocity proportional to…

Active solids such as cell collectives, colloidal clusters, and active metamaterials exhibit diverse collective phenomena, ranging from rigid body motion to shape-changing mechanisms. The nonlinear dynamics of such active materials remains…