Related papers: The dynamics of a collapsing polyelectrolyte gel
Attractive colloidal dispersions, suspensions of fine particles which aggregate and frequently form a space spanning elastic gel are ubiquitous materials in society with a wide range of applications. The colloidal networks in these…
In the wake of previous studies on the rattling-and-jumping diffusion in smectic liquid crystal phases of colloidal rods, we analyze here for the first time the heterogeneous dynamics in columnar phases. More specifically, we perform…
A new type of phase separation in the polyelectrolyte solutions consisting of several types of charged macromolecules differing in their degree of ionization is predicted via a general thermodynamic consideration. We show that even a small…
We study the effects of charge-regulated acid/base equilibrium on the swelling of polyelectrolyte gels, by considering a combination of the Poisson-Boltzmann theory and a two-site charge-regulation model based on the Langmuir adsorption…
We propose a framework to study the spatio-temporal evolution of liquid-liquid phase separation of weak polyelectrolytes in ionic solutions. Unlike strong polyelectrolytes, which carry a fixed charge, the charge state of weak…
We use large-scale computer simulations to explore the non-equilibrium aging dynamics in a microscopic model for colloidal gels. We find that gelation resulting from a kinetically-arrested phase separation is accompanied by `anomalous'…
Thermoresponsive microgels are one of the most investigated class of soft colloids, thanks to their ability to undergo a Volume Phase Transition (VPT) close to ambient temperature. However, this fundamental phenomenon still lacks a detailed…
Understanding the behavior of charged complex fluids is crucial for a plethora of important industrial, technological, and medical applications. Using coarse-grained molecular dynamics simulations, here we investigate the properties of a…
We study Coulomb drag between an active layer with a clean electron liquid and a passive layer with a pinned electron lattice in the regime of fast intralayer equilibration. Such a two-fluid system offers an experimentally realizable way to…
Thermo-responsive hydrogels are a promising material for creating controllable actuators for use in micro-scale devices, since they expand and contract significantly (absorbing or expelling fluid) in response to relatively small temperature…
Acid-induced release of stored ions from polyacrylic acid hydrogels (with a free surface fully permeable to the ion and acid flux) was observed to increase the gel osmotic pressure that leads to rapid, temporary swelling faster than the…
Globular proteins as well as recently synthesized colloids engineered with differently charged surface regions have in common a reduced bonding valence and a complex interaction pattern dominated by like-charge attraction and…
We used x-ray photon correlation spectroscopy to study the dynamics in the lamellar phase of a platelet suspension as a function of the particle concentration. We measured the collective diffusion coefficient along the director of the…
Conformational properties of a single flexible polyelectrolyte chain in a poor solvent are studied using constant temperature molecular dynamics simulation. The effects of counterions are explicitly taken in to account. Structural…
We study the reentrant condensation of polyelectrolytes in dilute solutions of small multivalent salts, whose phase-transition mechanism remains poorly understood. Motivated by recent full atomic simulation results reported by the Caltech…
Colloidal gels have strong industrial relevance as they can behave liquid- and solid-like. The latter allows them to support the buoyant weight against gravity. However, the system is intrinsically out-of-equilibrium, which means that the…
A transition from solid-like to liquid-like behavior occurs when colloidal gels are subjected to a prolonged exposure to a steady shear. This phenomenon, which is characterized by a yielding point, is found to be strongly dependent on the…
Polyelectrolytes such as single and double stranded DNA and many synthetic polymers undergo two structural transitions upon increasing the concentration of multivalent salt or molecules. First, the expanded-stretched chains in low…
The patterns arising from the differential swelling of gels are investigated experimentally and theoretically as a model for the differential growth of living tissues. Two geometries are considered: a thin strip of soft gel clamped to a…
We investigate theoretically the phase diagram of an insoluble charged surfactant monolayer in contact with a semi-dilute polyelectrolyte solution (of opposite charge). The polyelectrolytes are assumed to have long-range and attractive…