Related papers: The 2024 Motile Active Matter Roadmap
Plant morphogenesis relies on dynamic growth deformations at the cell and tissue scales driven by osmotic fluxes. A mechanistic understanding of this phenomenon demands a physical framework that integrates cell imbibition, tissue mechanics,…
Droplets, sub-millilitre liquid volumes with at least one interface, have traditionally served as compartments for storing, transporting, and delivering materials. Beyond familiar applications in food, coatings, and consumer goods, they…
This article aims to introduce the broad field of soft active matter physics and its relevance to the life sciences in simple, accessible language. Although this area of research is relatively new, it has already demonstrated significant…
The fabrication of nanomaterials involves self-ordering processes of functional molecules on inorganic surfaces. To obtain specific molecular arrangements, a common strategy is to equip molecules with functional groups. However, focusing on…
Incorporating cells within active biomaterial scaffolds is a promising strategy to develop forefront materials that can autonomously sense, respond, and alter the scaffold in response to environmental cues or internal cell circuitry. Using…
Large language models (LLMs) and vision-language models (VLMs) have the potential to transform biological research by enabling autonomous experimentation. Yet, their application remains constrained by rigid protocol design, limited…
Materials that behave like machines, e.g. functional materials that are able to change shape in response to external stimuli (Bhattacharya and James, 2005), often do so by exploiting phase transitions. Shape memory materials and the tail…
In the last 20 years, active matter has been a very successful research field, bridging the fundamental physics of nonequilibrium thermodynamics with applications in robotics, biology, and medicine. This field deals with active particles,…
We describe opportunities and challenges with wireless robotic materials. Robotic materials are multi-functional composites that tightly integrate sensing, actuation, computation and communication to create smart composites that can sense…
Continuous, adaptive learning, the ability to adapt to the environment and keep improving performance, is a hallmark of natural intelligence. Biological organisms excel in acquiring, transferring, and retaining knowledge while adapting to…
Engineering synthetic materials that mimic the remarkable complexity of living organisms is a fundamental challenge in science and technology. We study the spatiotemporal patterns that emerge when an active nematicfilm of microtubules and…
Active matter comprised of self-propelled interacting units holds a major promise for extraction of useful work from its seemingly chaotic out-of-equilibrium dynamics. Streamlining active matter to produce work is especially important at…
Spontaneous self-assembly in molecular systems is a fundamental route to both biological and engineered soft matter. Simple micellisation, emulsion formation, and polymer mixing principles are well understood. However, the principles behind…
Natural Immune system plays a vital role in the survival of the all living being. It provides a mechanism to defend itself from external predates making it consistent systems, capable of adapting itself for survival incase of changes. The…
Motivation: Agent-based modeling is an indispensable tool for studying complex biological systems. However, existing simulators do not always take full advantage of modern hardware and often have a field-specific software design. Results:…
In a cell or microorganism the processes that generate mass, energy, information transfer, and cell fate specification are seamlessly integrated through a complex network of various cellular constituents and reactions. However, despite the…
Mixtures of active and passive particles are ubiquitous at the microscale. Many essential microbial processes involve interactions with dead or immotile cells or passive crowders. When passive objects are immersed in active baths, their…
Active processes drive and guide biological dynamics across scales -- from subcellular cytoskeletal remodelling, through tissue development in embryogenesis, to population-level bacterial colonies expansion. In each of these, biological…
Active matter systems comprise self-propelled particles that move on a substrate while leaving chemical trails that influence other particles through chemotaxis (e.g., slime-depositing bacteria). Orientational chemotaxis manifests as a…
Active matter consists of units that generate mechanical work by consuming energy. Examples include living systems, such as assemblies of bacteria and biological tissues, biopolymers driven by molecular motors, and suspensions of synthetic…