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Entropic repulsion between DNA ring polymers under confinement is the key mechanism governing the spatial segregation of bacterial chromosomes, although it remains incompletely understood how proteins aid the process of entropic…
Renewable and biodegradable plastics derived from soy protein isolate (SPI) offer a promising alternative to conventional petroleum-based plastics, particularly for film-grade bioplastics applications such as plastic bags. However, even…
Water's ability to self-dissociate into H$_3$O$^+$ and OH$^-$ ions is central to acid-base chemistry and bioenergetics. Recent experimental advances have enabled the confinement of water down to the nanometre scale, even to the…
The ordering of nanoparticles into predetermined configurations is of importance to the design of advanced technologies. In this work, we moderate the surface anchoring against the bulk elasticity of liquid crystals to dynamically shape…
We performed molecular dynamics simulations to study equilibrium and flow properties of a liquid in a nano-channel with confining surfaces coated with a layer of grafted semiflexible polymers. The coverage spans a wide range of grafting…
Trapping macromolecules in nanopits finds multifarious applications in polymer separation, filtering biomolecules etc. However, tuning the locomotion of polymers in channels of nanoscopic dimensions is greatly restricted by the comparative…
We present a theoretical description of a mechanism for self assembly in binary soft nanoparticle systems of the type which were studied experimentally by Talapin et al [1]. We focus on, in particular, the conditions for formation of…
We investigate the cooperative effects of a single finite chain of monomers near an attractive substrate by first constructing a conformational pseudo-phase diagram based on the thermal fluctuations of energetic and structural quantities.…
We use molecular dynamics simulations to study a semidilute, unentangled polymer solution containing well dispersed, weakly attractive nanoparticles (NP) of size ($\sigma_N$) smaller than the polymer radius of gyration $R_g$. We find that…
Macromolecules can gain special properties by adopting knotted conformations, but engineering knotted macromolecules is a challenging task. Here we surprisingly observed that knotting can be very effectively produced in active polymers.…
A statistical mechanical description of flexible and semi-flexible polymer chains in a poor solvent is developed in the constant force and constant distance ensembles. We predict the existence of many intermediate states at low temperatures…
Plasmonic many-particle systems with precisely tuned resonances and coupling strengths can exhibit emergent collective properties governed by universal principles. In one-dimensional chains with alternating couplings, known as…
Configurations of a single semiflexible polymer is studied when it is pushed into a nanochannel in the case where the polymer persistence length $l_p$ is much longer than the channel diameter $D$, i.e. $l_p/D \gg 1$. Using numerical…
At the cutting edge of materials science, matter is designed to self-organize into structures that perform a wide range of functions. The past two decades have witnessed major innovations in the versatility of building blocks, ranging from…
We investigate the wrapping conformations of a strongly adsorbed polymer chain on an oppositely charged nano-sphere by employing a reduced (dimensionless) representation of a primitive chain-sphere model. This enables us to determine the…
The uptake and sorption of charged molecules by responsive polymer membranes and hydrogels in aqueous solutions is of key importance for the development of soft functional materials. Here we investigate the partitioning of simple monoatomic…
Polymers are increasingly used in the transport sector due to their many advantages; lightness, corrosion resistance, ease to process... However, most of them have limited mechanical properties. To improve these latter, one of the solutions…
The fabrication of versatile building blocks that are reliably self-assemble into desired ordered and disordered phases is amongst the hottest topics in contemporary material science. To this end, microscopic units of varying complexity,…
We determined the frequency dependent effective permittivity of a large ternary network of randomly positioned resistors, capacitors, and diodes. A linear circuit analysis of such systems is shown to match the experimental dielectric…
High quality metal thin films and nanostructures are critical building blocks for next generation nanotechnologies. They comprise low-loss circuit elements in nanodevices, provide new catalytic pathways for water splitting and $CO_2$…