Related papers: Polymer brush-induced depletion interactions and c…
By means of extensive Monte Carlo simulations of the bond fluctuation model, we study the effect of adding AB diblock copolymers on the properties of an interface between demixed homopolymer phases. The parameters are chosen such that the…
We study the stress distribution in a polymer brush material over a range of graft densities using molecular dynamics (MD) simulations and theory. Flexible polymer chains are treated as beads connected by nonlinear springs governed by a…
Biological membranes are elastic media in which the presence of a transmembrane protein leads to local bilayer deformation. The energetics of deformation allow two membrane proteins in close proximity to influence each other's equilibrium…
We carry out a coarse-grained molecular dynamics simulation of phospholipid vesicles with transmembrane proteins. We measure the mean and Gaussian curvatures of our protein-embedded vesicles and quantitatively show how protein clusters…
Control of frictional interactions among liquid-suspended particles has led to tunable, strikingly non-Newtonian rheology via the formation of strong flow constraints as particles come into close proximity under shear. Typically, these…
An extension of the Asakura-Oosawa-Vrij model of hard sphere colloids and non-adsorbing polymers, that takes polymer non-ideality into account through a repulsive stepfunction pair potential between polymers, is studied with grand canonical…
We study the effect of physical confinement on the capillary infiltration of polymers into cylindrical nanopores using molecular dynamics simulations. In particular, we probe whether the critical contact angle above which capillary rise…
The absorption of free linear chains in a polymer brush was studied with respect to chain size $L$ and compatibility $\chi$ with the brush by means of Monte Carlo (MC) simulations and Density Functional Theory (DFT) / Self-Consistent Field…
The understanding of dynamics and functioning of biological membranes and in particular of membrane embedded proteins is one of the most fundamental problems and challenges in modern biology and biophysics. In particular the impact of…
Membrane bending is an extensively studied problem from both modeling and experimental perspectives because of the wide implications of curvature generation in cell biology. Many of the curvature generating aspects in membranes can be…
The force-assisted desorption kinetics of a macromolecule from adhesive surface is studied theoretically, using the notion of tensile (Pincus) blobs, as well as by means of Monte-Carlo (MC) and Molecular Dynamics (MD) simulations. We show…
We investigate the stretching response of a thick polymer model by means of extensive stochastic simulations. The computational results are synthesized in an analytic expression that characterizes how the force versus elongation curve…
Neutral or charged polymers that are densely end-grafted to surfaces form brush-like structures and are highly stretched under good-solvent conditions. We discuss and compare relevant results from scaling models, self-consistent-field…
Integral membrane proteins deform the surrounding bilayer creating long-ranged forces that influence distant proteins. These forces can be attractive or repulsive, depending on the proteins' shape, height, contact angle with the bilayer, as…
Bottle brushes are polymeric macromolecules made of a linear polymeric backbone grafted with side chains. The choice of the grafting density {\sigma}g, the length ns the grafted side chains and their chemical nature fully determines the…
We present a numerical study of forced polymer translocation by using two separate pore models. Both of them have been extensively used in previous forced translocation studies. We show that variations in the pore model affect the forced…
Cell adhesion proteins typically form stable clusters that anchor the cell membrane to its environment. Several works have suggested that cell membrane protein clusters can emerge from a local feedback between the membrane curvature and the…
While recent efforts have shown how local structure plays an essential role in the dynamic heterogeneity of homogeneous glass-forming materials, systems containing interfaces such as thin films or composite materials remain poorly…
Percolation phenomena of homopolymer brushes on a planar substrate are simulated using the molecular Monte Carlo method in 3 dimensions. The grafted polymers are isolated from each other at extremely low grafting density, whereas a…
We consider a polymer brush grafted to a surface (acting as an electrode) and bearing a charged group at its free end. Using a second distant electrode, the brush is subject to a constant electric field. Based on a coarse-grained continuum…