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The cytoskeleton in eukaryotic cells plays several crucial roles. In terms of intracellular transport, motor proteins use the cytoskeletal filaments as a backbone along which they can actively transport biological cargos such as vesicles…
Molecular dynamics studies of nono-sized rigid grains, droplets and bubbles in nano-sized pores indicate that the drag force may have a hydrodynamic form if the moving object is dense and small compared to the pore diameter. Otherwise, the…
The transport of soft viscoelastic gels through confined geometries underlies critical processes in biomedical, biological, and industrial systems. Here, we examine the translocation of a spherical microgel through a narrow capillary whose…
We study bacterial diffusion in disordered porous media. Interactions with obstacles, at unknown locations, make this problem challenging. We approach it by abstracting the environment to cell states with memoryless transitions. With this,…
Nanofluidic transport is ubiquitous in natural systems from extra-cellular communication in biology to geological phenomena, and promotes the emergence of new technologies such as energy harvesting and water desalination. While experimental…
Swimming microbes, such as bacteria and algae, live in diverse habitats including soil, ocean and human body which are characterized by structural boundaries and heterogeneous fluid flows. Although much progress has been made in…
Biopolymer networks having a meshwork topology, e.g., extracellular matrix and mucus gels, are ubiquitous. It is an open question to understand how self-propelled agents such as Janus colloidal particles diffuse through such a biopolymer…
The movement of molecules inside living cells is a fundamental feature of biological processes. The ability to both observe and analyse the details of molecular diffusion in vivo at the single molecule and single cell level can add…
Fundamental understanding of the effect of microscopic parameters on the dynamics of probe particles in different complex environments has wide implications. Examples include diffusion of proteins in the biological hydrogels, porous media,…
Biomolecular condensates formed through the phase separation of proteins and nucleic acids are widely observed, offering a fundamental means of organizing intracellular materials in a membrane-less fashion. Traditionally, these condensates…
Bacteria on surfaces exhibit collective behaviors, such as active turbulence and active stresses, which result from their motility, growth, and interactions with their local surroundings. However, interfacial deformations on soft surfaces…
Structure of polymer electrolytes membranes, e.g., Nafion, inside fuel cell catalyst layers has significant impact on the electrochemical activity and transport phenomena that determine cell performance. In those regions, Nafion can be…
Diffusive transport of particles or, more generally, small objects is a ubiquitous feature of physical and chemical reaction systems. In configurations containing confining walls or constrictions transport is controlled both by the…
Bacterial colonies composed of elongated cells form active nematic fluids that spontaneously self-organise into ordered domains of aligned cells and exhibit self-generated chaotic flows powered by cell growth. While their dynamics have…
The evolutionary success of bacteria lies in their ability to form complex surface-associated communities in diverse biophysical settings. However, it remains poorly understood how compliance of soft surfaces, measured in terms of their…
Molecular motors are macromolecular complexes which use some form of input energy to perform mechanical work. The filamentary tracks, on which these motors move, are made of either proteins (e.g., microtubules) or nucleic acids (DNA or…
Transport of molecules across membrane channels is investigated theoretically using exactly solvable discrete stochastic site-binding models. It is shown that the interaction potential between molecules and the channel has a strong effect…
Successful assembly of suspended nanoscale rod-like particles depends on fundamental phenomena controlling rotational and translational diffusion. Despite the significant developments in fluidic fabrication of nanostructured materials, the…
Bacterial colonies are a well-known example of living active matter, exhibiting collective behaviors such as nematic alignment and collective motion that play an important role in the spread of microbial infections. While the underlying…
Biological systems are known to communicate by diffusing chemical signals in the surrounding medium. However, most of the recent literature has neglected the electron transfer mechanism occurring amongst living cells, and its role in…