Related papers: Dynamic control of active droplets using light-res…
In this article, we describe the instability of a contact line under nonequilibrium conditions mainly based on the results of our recent studies. Two experimental examples are presented: the self-propelled motion of a liquid droplet and…
A range of technologies require the directed motion of nanoscale droplets on solid substrates. A way of realizing this effect is durotaxis, whereby a stiffness gradient of a substrate can induce directional motion without requiring an…
Recent experiments have shown that liquid drops on highly deformable substrates exhibit mutual interactions. This is similar to the Cheerios effect, the capillary interaction of solid particles at a liquid interface, but now the roles of…
Experiments have recently shown the feasibility of utilising bacteria as micro-scale robotic devices, with special attention paid to the development of bacteria-driven micro-swimmers taking advantage of built-in actuation and sensing…
We consider a liquid droplet which is propelled solely by internal flow. In a simple model, this flow is generated by an autonomous actuator, which moves on a prescribed trajectory inside the droplet. In a biological system, the device…
Bacterial biofilms play a significant role in various fields that impact our daily lives, from detrimental public health hazards to beneficial applications in bioremediation, biodegradation, and wastewater treatment. However,…
Droplets are essential for spatially controlling biomolecules in cells. To work properly, cells need to control the emergence and morphology of droplets. On the one hand, driven chemical reactions can affect droplets profoundly. For…
The acoustofluidic method holds great promise for manipulating microorganisms. When exposed to the steady vortex structures of acoustic streaming flow, these microorganisms exhibit intriguing dynamic behaviors, such as hydrodynamic trapping…
Droplet motion on surfaces influences phenomena as diverse as microfluidic liquid handling, printing technology and micro-organism migration. Typically, droplet motion is achieved by inducing energy gradients on a substrate or flow on the…
We present a novel dynamic light scattering setup to probe, with time and space resolution, the microscopic dynamics of soft matter systems confined within millimeter-sized spherical drops. By using an ad-hoc optical layout, we tackle the…
In equilibrium liquid crystals, chirality leads to a variety of spectacular three-dimensional structures, but chiral and achiral phases with the same broken continuous symmetries have identical long-time, large-scale dynamics. In this…
The nature of adhesion of droplets to surfaces is a long pending scientific question. With the evolution of complex surfaces, quantification and prediction of these forces become intricate. Nevertheless, understanding these forces is highly…
We report spontaneous motion in a fully bio-compatible system consisting of pure water droplets in an oil-surfactant medium of squalane and monoolein. Water from the droplet is solubilized by the reverse micellar solution, creating a…
An elastomer swelling actuator deforms by absorbing a fluid, thus generating mechanical movement. We show that depositing small droplets of low molecular weight liquid crystal on liquid crystal elastomer (LCE) films leads to shape changes…
The spontaneous migration of droplets on conical fibers is studied experimentally by depositing silicone oil droplets onto conical glass fibers. Their motion is recorded using optical microscopy and analysed to extract the relevant…
Biomolecular condensates are small droplets forming spontaneously in biological cells via phase separation. They play a role in many cellular processes, but it is unclear how cells control them. Cellular regulation often relies on…
Motivated by the experimental ability to produce monodisperse particles in microfluidic devices, we study theoretically the hydrodynamic stability of driven and active crystals. We first recall the theoretical tools allowing to quantify the…
Rheotaxis is a well-known phenomenon among microbial organisms and artificial active colloids, wherein the swimmers respond to an imposed flow. We report the first experimental evidence of upstream rheotaxis by spherical active droplets. It…
The bacterium E.Coli swims in a zig-zag manner, in a series of straight runs and tumbles occurring alternately, with the run-durations dependent on the local spatial gradient of chemo-attractants/repellants. This enables the organism to…
We investigate the effect of an anisotropic substrate on the turbulent dynamics of a simulated two dimensional active nematic. This is introduced as an anisotropic friction and an effective anisotropic viscosity, with the orientation of the…