Related papers: Acousto-microfluidic Control of Liquid Crystals
Nematic drops suspended in the isotropic phase of the same substance were subjected to alternating electrical fields of varying frequency. The system was carefully kept in the isotropic-nematic coexistance region, which was broadened due to…
Ultrasound-driven oscillating micro-bubbles have been used as active actuators in microfluidic devices to perform manifold tasks such as mixing, sorting and manipulation of microparticles. A common configuration consists on side-bubbles,…
The influence of controlable parameters like temperature and wavelength on the trajectories of light in a nematic liquid crystal with topological defects is studied through a geometric model. The model incorporates phenomenological details…
We demonstrate theoretically that acoustic forces acting on inhomogeneous fluids can be used to pattern and manipulate solute concentration fields into spatio-temporally controllable configurations stabilized against gravity. A theoretical…
We introduce several new models whose common feature is to take into account effects from topological vorticity. The macroscopic unknown is driven by a dissipative anomalous diffusion (of SQG-type) and is coupled with the orientation of the…
The tendency for flows in microfluidic systems to behave linearly poses a challenge for designing integrated flow control schemes to carry out complex fluid processing tasks. This hindrance has led to the use of numerous external control…
Liquid crystals consisting of biaxial particles can exhibit a much richer phase behavior than their uniaxial counterparts. Usually, one has to rely on simulation results to understand the phase diagram of these systems, since very few…
Biological systems achieve precise control over ambient fluids through the self-organization of active protein structures including flagella, cilia, and cytoskeletal networks. In active structures individual proteins consume chemical energy…
Diffusioosmotic flow arises in microfluidic configurations due to solute concentration gradients. In soft microfluidic channels, internal pressure gradients generated by diffusioosmotic flow to conserve mass result in elastic deformation of…
We theoretically investigate the threshold for the director reorientation from the homeotropic state to the hybrid homeotropic-planar state and vice versa in a cell filled with a flexoelectric nematic liquid crystal (NLC) subjected to an…
We investigate the turbulent dynamics of a two-dimensional active nematic liquid crystal con- strained on a curved surface. Using a combination of hydrodynamic and particle-based simulations, we demonstrate that the fundamental structural…
This paper aims to provide an introduction to a basic form of the ${\bf Q}$-tensor approach to modelling liquid crystals, which has seen increased interest in recent years. The increase in interest in this type of modelling approach has…
Chromonic liquid crystals (CLCs) are lyotropic materials which are attracting growing interest for their adaptability to living systems. A considerable body of works has been devoted to exploring their properties and applications. In this…
Liquid crystals in two dimensions undergo a first-order isotropic-to-quasi-nematic transition, provided the particle interactions are sufficiently ``sharp and narrow''. This implies phase coexistence between isotropic and quasi-nematic…
Active colloids and liquid crystals are capable of locally converting the macroscopically-supplied energy into directional motion and promise a host of new applications, ranging from drug delivery to cargo transport at the mesoscale. Here…
Topological defects resulted from boundary constraints in confined liquid crystals have attracted extensive research interests. In this paper, we use numerical simulation to study the phase transition dynamics in the context of stochastic…
Liquids flowing against solid surfaces experience friction. While solid friction is familiar to anyone with a sense of touch, liquid friction is much more exotic. At macroscopic scales indeed, the assumption of inifinite friction, i.e. that…
Topological photonics harnesses the physics of topological insulators to control the behavior of light. Photonic modes robust against material imperfections are an example of such control. In this work, we propose a soft-matter platform…
Systems involving nematic liquid crystals subjected to magnetic fields or electric fields are modeled using the Oseen-Frank macroscopic continuum theory, and general criteria are developed to assess the local stability of equilibrium…
We introduce a method for analyzing the physical properties of nanoparticles in fluids via the competition between viscous drag and optical forces. By flowing particles through a microfluidic device containing an optical microcavity which…