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Related papers: Multi-defect Dynamics in Active Nematics

200 papers

Active nematics in two dimensions stir themselves efficiently through internally generated chaotic flows, largely driven by motile $+1/2$ disclinations. We investigate how this tendency toward chaotic fluid stirring can, counterintuitively,…

The motion of topological defects is an important feature of the dynamics of all liquid crystals, and is especially conspicuous in active liquid crystals. Understanding defect motion is a challenging theoretical problem, because the…

Soft Condensed Matter · Physics 2019-01-24 Xingzhou Tang , Jonathan V. Selinger

Collectively moving cellular systems often contain a proportion of dead cells or non-motile genotypes. When mixed, nematically aligning motile and non-motile agents are known to segregate spontaneously. However, the role that topological…

Topological defects are one of the most conspicuous features of liquid crystals. In two dimensional nematics, they have been shown to behave effectively as particles with both, charge and orientation, which dictate their interactions. Here,…

Soft Condensed Matter · Physics 2021-07-14 Daniel J. G. Pearce , Karsten Kruse

Active materials are those in which individual, uncoordinated local stresses drive the material out of equilibrium on a global scale. Examples of such assemblies can be seen across scales from schools of fish to the cellular cytoskeleton…

Soft Condensed Matter · Physics 2022-09-30 Nitin Kumar , Rui Zhang , Steven A. Redford , Juan J. de Pablo , Margaret L. Gardel

We study emergent dynamics in a viscous drop subject to interfacial nematic activity. Using hydrodynamic simulations, we show how the interplay of nematodynamics, activity-driven flows and surface deformations gives rise to a sequence of…

Soft Condensed Matter · Physics 2024-04-19 Mohammadhossein Firouznia , David Saintillan

Being intrinsically nonequilibrium, active materials can potentially perform functions that would be thermodynamically forbidden in passive materials. However, active systems have diverse local attractors that correspond to distinct…

Soft Condensed Matter · Physics 2024-10-16 Saptorshi Ghosh , Aparna Baskaran , Michael F. Hagan

We propose an agent-based model of active flexible rods. Inspired by cytoskeletal flows, we introduce activity by an internal flow that contributes to the dissipative forces. The active force between our agents is central and reciprocal,…

Soft Condensed Matter · Physics 2026-03-06 Mathieu Dedenon , Carles Blanch-Mercader , Karsten Kruse , Jens Elgeti

Inspired by recent experiments that highlight the role of nematic defects in the morphogenesis of epithelial tissues, we develop a minimal framework to study the dynamics of an active curved surface driven by its nematic texture. Allowing…

Soft Condensed Matter · Physics 2022-09-14 Farzan Vafa , L. Mahadevan

We describe the flows and morphological dynamics of topological defect lines and loops in three-dimensional active nematics and show, using theory and numerical modelling, that they are governed by the local profile of the orientational…

Soft Condensed Matter · Physics 2020-03-13 Jack Binysh , Žiga Kos , Simon Čopar , Miha Ravnik , Gareth P. Alexander

We present a hydrodynamic model for a thin spherical shell of active nematic liquid crystal with an arbitrary configuration of defects. The active flows generated by defects in the director lead to the formation of stable vortices,…

Soft Condensed Matter · Physics 2017-11-13 Diana Khoromskaia , Gareth P. Alexander

Active nematics are an important new paradigm in soft condensed matter systems. They consist of rod-like components with an internal driving force pushing them out of equilibrium. The resulting fluid motion exhibits chaotic advection, in…

We introduce a general description of localised distortions in active nematics using the framework of active nematic multipoles. We give the Stokesian flows for arbitrary multipoles in terms of differentiation of a fundamental flow response…

Soft Condensed Matter · Physics 2023-04-04 Alexander J. H. Houston , Gareth P. Alexander

Two-dimensional active nematics are often modeled using phenomenological continuum theories that describe the dynamics of the nematic director and fluid velocity through partial differential equations (PDEs). While these models provide a…

Using agent-based simulations of self-propelled particles subject to short-range repulsion and nematic alignment we explore the dynamical phases of a dense active material confined to the surface of a sphere. We map the dynamical phase…

Soft Condensed Matter · Physics 2018-04-25 Silke Henkes , M. Cristina Marchetti , Rastko Sknepnek

We consider active nematodynamics on deformable surfaces. Based on a thermodynamically consistent surface Beris-Edwards model we add nematic activity and focus on the emerging additional coupling mechanism between the nematic field, the…

Soft Condensed Matter · Physics 2024-05-24 Ingo Nitschke , Axel Voigt

Active nematics are microscopically driven liquid crystals that exhibit dynamical steady states characterized by the creation and annihilation of topological defects. Motivated by experimental realizations of such systems made of biopolymer…

Soft Condensed Matter · Physics 2018-09-05 Abhijeet Joshi , Elias Putzig , Aparna Baskaran , Michael Hagan

The topological properties of many materials are central to their behavior, with the dynamics of topological defects being particularly important to intrinsically out-of-equilibrium, active materials. In this paper, local manipulation of…

Soft Condensed Matter · Physics 2019-11-01 David P. Rivas , Tyler N. Shendruk , Robert R. Henry , Daniel H. Reich , Robert L. Leheny

We establish how active stress globally affects the morphology of disclination lines of a three dimensional active nematic liquid crystal under chaotic flow. Thanks to a defect detection algorithm based on the local nematic orientation, we…

Soft Condensed Matter · Physics 2025-06-30 Pasquale Digregorio , Cecilia Rorai , Ignacio Pagonabarraga , Federico Toschi

Topological defects are increasingly being identified in various biological systems, where their characteristic flow fields and stress patterns are associated with continuous active stress generation by biological entities. Here, using…

Soft Condensed Matter · Physics 2022-11-09 Lasse Bonn , Aleksandra Ardaseva , Romain Mueller , Tyler N. Shendruk , Amin Doostmohammadi