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We describe a microscope-based optical setup that allows us to perform space-and time-resolved measurements of the spectral reflectance of transparent substrates coated with ultrathin films. This technique is applied to investigate the…
Shear responsive surfaces offer potential advances in a number of applications. Surface functionalisation using polymer brushes is one route to such properties, particularly in the case of entangled polymers. We report on neutron…
Polymer brushes are increasingly used to tailor surface physicochemistry for various applications such as wetting, adhesion of biological objects, implantable devices, etc. We perform Dissipative Particle Dynamics simulations to study the…
Polymer brush layers are responsive materials that swell in contact with good solvents and their vapors. We deposit drops of an almost completely wetting volatile oil onto an oleophilic polymer brush layer and follow the response of the…
We resolve the Schr\"{o}der paradox for PNiPAAm brushes, showing experimentally that swelling at 100\% relative humidity (RH) matches the liquid state. This occurs via a sharp increase in swelling above 98\%~RH, a behavior standard models…
Molecular dynamics simulations of a short-chain polymer melt between two brush-covered surfaces under shear have been performed. The end-grafted polymers which constitute the brush have the same chemical properties as the free chains in the…
We study the effect of polydispersity on the structure of polymer brushes by analytical theory, a numerical self-consistent field approach, and Monte Carlo simulations. The polydispersity is represented by the Schulz-Zimm chain-length…
We probe, using the Surface Forces Apparatus, the thermal response of poly(N-isopropylacrylamide) (PNIPAM) brushes of various grafting densities, grown from plasma-activated mica by means of surface-initiated polymerization. We thus show…
Understanding the dynamics of drops on polymer-coated surfaces is crucial for optimizing applications such as self-cleaning materials or microfluidic devices. While the static and dynamic properties of deposited drops have been well…
We briefly review recent advances in the hydrodynamic modeling of the dynamics of droplets on adaptive substrates, in particular, solids that are covered by polymer brushes. Thereby, the focus are long-wave and full-curvature variants of…
When a liquid drop spreads on an adaptive substrate the latter changes its properties what may result in an intricate coupled dynamics of drop and substrate. Here we present a generic mesoscale hydrodynamic model for such processes that is…
We consider a polymer brush grafted to a surface (acting as an electrode) and bearing a charged group at its free end. Using a second distant electrode, the brush is subject to a constant electric field. Based on a coarse-grained continuum…
Molecular Dynamics simulations of a coarse-grained bead-spring model of flexible macromolecules tethered with one end to the surface of a cylindrical pore are presented. Chain length $N$ and grafting density $\sigma$ are varied over a wide…
The steepest-entropy-ascent quantum thermodynamic (SEAQT) framework is utilized to study the effects of temperature on polymer brushes. The brushes are represented by a discrete energy spectrum and energy degeneracies obtained through the…
A method is presented for the determination of complex-valued compression and shear elastic moduli of polymers for ultrasound applications. The resulting values, which are scarcely reported in the literature, are found with uncertainties…
Large scale Monte Carlo simulations of dense layers of grafted polymer chains in good solvent conditions are used to explore the relaxation of a polymer brush. Monomer displacements are analyzed for the directions parallel and perpendicular…
We describe an extension of multi-speckle diffusing wave spectroscopy adapted to follow the non-stationary microscopic dynamics in drying films and coatings in a very reactive way and with a high dynamic range. We call this technique…
A coarse grained model for flexible polymers end-grafted to repulsive spherical nanoparticles is studied for various chain lengths and grafting densities under good solvent conditions, by Molecular Dynamics methods and density functional…
We study the coalescence of identical viscous blisters beneath an elastic sheet both experimentally and numerically. Using a time-resolved synthetic schlieren technique, we measure the evolution of the thickness field of the merging…
Using a coarse-grained bead-spring model for semi-flexible macromolecules forming a polymer brush, structure and dynamics of the polymers is investigated, varying chain stiffness and grafting density. The anchoring condition for the grafted…