Related papers: Tuneable defect-curvature coupling and topological…
Topological defects in systems with liquid-crystalline order are crucial in determining their large-scale properties. In active systems, they are known to have properties impossible at equilibrium: for example, $+1/2$ defects in…
The geometric shape, symmetry, and topology of colloidal particles often allow for controlling colloidal phase behavior and physical properties of these soft matter systems. In liquid crystalline dispersions, colloidal particles with low…
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…
Active matter is characterized by its ability to induce motion by self-generated stress. In the case of a solid, such motion can lead to shape transformations. The stress-generating components can be anisotropic endowing the material with…
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…
Biological active matter like the cytoskeleton or tissues are characterized by their ability to transform chemical energy into mechanical stress. In addition, it often exhibits orientational order, which is essential for many cellular and…
Topology can manifest itself in colloids when quantified by invariants like Euler characteristics of nonzero-genus colloidal surfaces, albeit spherical colloidal particles are most often studied, and colloidal particles with complex…
Morphological trends in growing colonies of living cells are at the core of physiological and evolutionary processes. Using active gel equations, which include cell division, we show that shape changes during the growth can be regulated by…
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…
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.…
Topological defects play a central role in the physics of many materials, including magnets, superconductors and liquid crystals. In active fluids, defects become autonomous particles that spontaneously propel from internal active stresses…
Morphogenesis of living systems involves topological shape transformations which are highly unusual in the inanimate world. Here we demonstrate that a droplet of a nematic liquid crystal changes its equilibrium shape from a simply-connected…
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…
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…
Topological defects in active polar fluids exhibit complex dynamics driven by internally generated stresses, reflecting the deep interplay between topology, flow, and non-equilibrium hydrodynamics. Feedback control offers a powerful means…
Coherent flows of self-propelled particles are characterized by vortices and jets that sustain chaotic flows, referred to as active turbulence. Here, we reveal a crossover between defect-free active turbulence and active turbulence laden…
Non-equilibrium dynamics of topological defects can be used as a fundamental propulsion mechanism in microscopic active matter. Here, we demonstrate swimming of topological defect-propelled colloidal particles in (passive) nematic fluids…
Designing smart devices with tunable shapes has important applications in industrial manufacture. In this paper, we investigate the nonlinear deformation and the morphological transitions between buckling, necking, and snap-through…
We investigate the dynamics of an active particle in two-dimensional spherical crystals, which provide an ideal environment to illustrate the interplay of active particle and crystallographic defects. A moving active particle is observed to…
Topological defects are crucial to the thermodynamics and structure of condensed matter systems. For instance, when incorporated into crystalline membranes like graphene, disclinations with positive and negative topological charge…