Related papers: Defect Line Coarsening and Refinement in Active Ne…
Liquid crystals inevitably possess topological defect excitations generated through boundary conditions, applied fields or in quenches to the ordered phase. In equilibrium pairs of defects coarsen and annihilate as the uniform ground state…
Topological defects are at the root of the large-scale organization of liquid crystals. In two-dimensional active nematics, two classes of topological defects of charges $\pm 1/2$ are known to play a major role due to active stresses.…
A nematic liquid crystal confined to the surface of a sphere exhibits topological defects of total charge $+2$ due to the topological constraint. In equilibrium, the nematic field forms four $+1/2$ defects, located at the corners of a…
Confined active nematics exhibit rich dynamical behavior, including spontaneous flows, periodic defect dynamics, and chaotic `active turbulence'. Here, we study these phenomena using the framework of Exact Coherent Structures, which has…
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,…
We investigate the dynamics of active nematic liquid crystals on deformable membranes, focusing on the interplay between active stress and anisotropic curvature coupling. Using a minimal model, we simulate the coupled evolution of the…
Active matter locally converts chemical energy into mechanical work and, for this reason, it provides new mechanisms of pattern formation. In particular, active gels made of protein motors and filaments are far-from-equilibrium systems that…
When a nematic liquid crystal is confined in a porous medium with strong anchoring conditions, topological defects, called disclinations, are stably formed with numerous possible configurations. Since the energy barriers between them are…
We investigate similarities in the micro-structural dynamics between externally driven and actively driven nematics. Walls, lines of strong deformations in the director field, and topological defects are characteristic features of an active…
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,…
Topological defects play a key role in two-dimensional active nematics, and a transient role in two-dimensional active polar fluids. In this paper, we study both the transient and long-time behavior of defects in two-dimensional active…
We numerically model a two-dimensional active nematic confined by a periodic array of fixed obstacles. Even in the passive nematic, the appearance of topological defects is unavoidable due to planar anchoring by the obstacle surfaces. We…
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…
We perform energy spectrum analysis of the active turbulence in 3D bulk active nematic using continuum numerical modelling. Specifically, we calculate the spectra of two main energy contributions---kinetic energy and nematic elastic…
We propose a reaction-diffusion system that converts topological information of an active nematic into chemical signals. We show that a curvature-activated reaction dipole is sufficient for creating a system that dynamically senses topology…
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…
We study the spatiotemporal patterns that emerge when an active nematic film is topologically constraint. These topological constraints allow to control the non-equilibrium dynamics of the active system. We consider ellipsoidal shapes for…
Topological defects are a ubiquitous phenomenon in diverse physical systems. In nematic liquid crystals (LCs), they are dynamic, physicochemically distinct, sensitive to stimuli, and are thereby promising for a range of applications.…
We numerically study two-dimensional active nematics with periodic activity patterning. For stripes of activity, we observe a transition from two-dimensional to one-dimensional active turbulence as the maximum active force and distance…
There is now growing evidence of the emergence and biological functionality of liquid crystal features, including nematic order and topological defects, in cellular tissues. However, how such features that intrinsically rely on particle…