Related papers: Inducing mechanical self-healing in glassy polymer…
Aging to the equilibrium liquid state of organic glasses is studied. The glasses were prepared by cooling the liquid to temperatures just below the glass transition. Aging following a temperature jump was studied by measuring the dielectric…
We investigate the local viscosity of a polymer glass around its glass transition temperature using environment-sensitive fluorescent molecular rotors embedded in the polymer matrix. The rotors' fluorescence depends on the local viscosity,…
The elastic coupling between plastic events is generally invoked to interpret plastic properties and failure of amorphous soft glassy materials. We report an experiment where the emergence of a self-organized plastic flow is observed well…
We use computer simulations to study the dynamics of a physical gel at high densities where gelation and the glass transition interfere. We report and provide detailed physical understanding of complex relaxation patterns for time…
Physically assembled gels have promising applications in many fields because of their tunable mechanical properties. Here, we report the mechanical properties as a function of polymer volume fraction ($\phi$) for a physical gel system…
A first step toward a multi-scale and multi-physic model --a virtual material-- for self-healing ceramic matrix composites is presented. Each mechanism --mechanical, chemical-- that act on the material's lifetime at a given scale --fibre,…
Using depolarized light scattering, we have recently shown that structural relaxation in a broad range of supercooled liquids follows, to good approximation, a generic line shape with high-frequency power law $\omega^{-1/2}$. We now…
The time evolution of the pore size distributions and mechanical properties of amorphous solids at constant pressure is studied using molecular dynamics simulations. The porous glasses were initially prepared at constant volume conditions…
While experiments and simulations have provided a rich picture of the dynamic heterogeneity in glasses at constant temperature or under steady shear, the dynamics of glasses under oscillatory shear remain comparatively less explored. Recent…
Understanding how topological constraints affect the dynamics of polymers in solution is at the basis of any polymer theory and it is particularly needed for melts of rings. These polymers fold as crumpled and space-filling objects and,…
Solids deform and fluids flow, but soft glassy materials, such as emulsions, foams, suspensions, and pastes, exhibit an intricate mix of solid and liquid-like behavior. While much progress has been made to understand their elastic (small…
The emergence of glassy behavior of electrons is investigated for systems close to the disorder and/or interaction-driven metal-insulator transitions. Our results indicate that Anderson localization effects strongly stabilize such glassy…
External stress can accelerate molecular mobility of amorphous solids by several orders of magnitude. The changes in mobility are commonly interpreted through the Eyring model, which invokes an empirical activation volume whose origin…
Vitrimers are a special class of polymers that undergo dynamic cross-linking under thermal stimuli. Their ability to exchange covalent bonds can be harnessed to mitigate damage in a composite or to achieve recyclable aerospace composites.…
Glassy polymers show strain hardening: at constant extensional load, their flow first accelerates, then arrests. Recent experiments have found this to be accompanied by a striking and unexplained dip in the segmental relaxation time. Here…
Quasi-brittle plastic yielding is a salient feature of well-annealed glassy materials. Here we show that the same behavior is characteristic of perfect crystals after they experience mechanically driven elastic instability leading to…
Glassy dynamics in a confluent monolayer is indispensable in morphogenesis, wound healing, bronchial asthma, and many others; a detailed theoretical framework for such a system is, therefore, important. Vertex model (VM) simulations have…
We model the behaviour of a single colloid embedded in a cross-linked polymer gel, immersed in a viscous background fluid. External fields actuate the particle into a periodic motion, which deforms the embedding matrix and creates a local…
The plastic deformation of crystalline materials can be understood by considering their structural defects such as disclinations and dislocations. Although glasses are also solids, their structure resembles closely the one of a liquid and…
A spin glass is a diluted magnetic material in which the magnetic moments are randomly interacting, with a huge number of metastable states which prevent reaching equilibrium. Spin-glass models are conceptually simple, but require very…