Related papers: Nonlinear Poisson effect in affine semiflexible po…
We study the elastic response of composites of rods embedded in elastic media. We calculate the micro-mechanical response functions, and bulk elastic constants as functions of rod density. We find two fixed points for Poisson's ratio with…
Nonlinear extensional flows are common in polymer processing but remain challenging theoretically because dramatic stretching of chains deforms the entanglement network far from equilibrium. Here, we present coarse-grained simulations of…
The rheological properties of fibrin networks have been of long-standing interest. As such there is a wealth of studies of their shear and tensile responses, but their compressive behavior remains unexplored. Here, by characterization of…
Polymer adsorption is a fundamental problem in statistical mechanics that has direct relevance to diverse disciplines ranging from biological lubrication to stability of colloidal suspensions. We combine experiments with computer…
The toughness of a polymer material can increase significantly if two networks are combined into one material. This toughening effect is a consequence of a transition from a brittle to a ductile failure response. Although this transition…
We study the mechanics of nematically ordered semiflexible networks showing that they, like isotropic networks, undergo an affine to non-affine cross-over controlled by the ratio of the filament length to the non-affinity length. Deep in…
Aiming at the mechanical properties of cross-linked biopolymers, we set up and analyze a model of two weakly bending wormlike chains subjected to a tensile force, with regularly spaced inter-chain bonds (cross-links) represented by harmonic…
We characterize the force state of shear-loaded granular matter by relating the macroscopic stress to statistical properties of the force network. The purely repulsive nature of the interaction between grains naturally provides an upper…
Cell proliferation, apoptosis, and myosin-dependent contraction can generate elastic stress and strain in living tissues, which may be dissipated by internal rearrangement through cell topological transition and cytoskeletal reorganization.…
We study the effect of polydispersity on the macroscopic physical properties of granular packings in two and three dimensions. A mean-field approach is developed to approximate the macroscale quantities as functions of the microscopic ones.…
We investigate the viscoelastic properties of entangled networks of semiflexible polymers. At intermediate time scales the elastic response of these networks to shear deformation is described by the plateau modulus $G$. Different scaling…
The conformational properties of a semi-flexible polymer chain, anchored at one end in a uniform force field, are studied in a simple two-dimensional model. Recursion relations are derived for the partition function and then iterated…
We study the linear instability with respect to necking of a filament of polymeric fluid undergoing uniaxial extension. Contrary to the widely discussed Considere criterion, we find the onset of instability to relate closely to the onset of…
Cells moving on a two dimensional substrate generate motion by polymerizing actin filament networks inside a flat membrane protrusion. New filaments are generated by branching off existing ones, giving rise to branched network structures.…
The stretching response of polymer chains fundamentally determines the mechanical properties of polymer networks. In this Letter, we develop a statistical mechanics model that incorporates both bond stretching and bond angle deformation,…
A recent large deflection cantilever model is considered. The principal nonlinear effects come through the beam's inextensibility---local arc length preservation---rather than traditional extensible effects attributed to fully restricted…
The nonequilibrium dynamical behavior and structure formation of end-functionalized semiflexible polymer suspensions under flow are investigated by mesoscale hydrodynamic simulations. The hybrid simulation approach combines the…
A formula is derived for stiffness of a polymer chain in terms of the distribution function of end-to-end vectors. This relationship is applied to calculate the stiffness of Gaussian chains (neutral and carrying electric charges at the…
Continuum elasticity is a powerful tool applicable in a broad range of physical systems and phenomena. Yet, understanding how and on what scales material disorder may lead to the breakdown of continuum elasticity is not fully understood. We…
To assess the role of single-chain elasticity, non-affine strain fields and pre-stressed reference states we present and discuss the results of numerical and analytical analyses of modified 8-chain Arruda-Boyce model for cross-linked…