Related papers: Control of encounter kinetics by chemically active…
Phase separation drives the formation of biomolecular condensates in cells, which comprise many components and sometimes possess multiple phases. The equilibrium physics of phase separation is well understood, but many components in…
Coupling between chemical fuel consumption and phase separation can lead to condensation at a nonequilibrium steady state, resulting in phase behaviors that are not described by equilibrium thermodynamics. Theoretical models of such…
Biomolecules composed of a limited set of chemical building blocks can co-localize into distinct, spatially segregated compartments known as biomolecular condensates. While many condensates are known to form spontaneously via phase…
Particle beams are important tools for probing atomic and molecular interactions. Here we demonstrate that particle beams also offer a unique opportunity to investigate interactions in macroscopic systems, such as granular media. Motivated…
Chemically active colloids or enzymes cluster into dense droplets driven by their phoretic response to collectively generated chemical gradients. Employing Brownian dynamics simulation techniques, our study of the dynamics of such a…
Active emulsions can spontaneously form self-propelled droplets or phoretic micropumps. It has been predicted that the interaction with their self-generated chemical fields can lead to multistable higher-order flows and chemodynamic…
Active nematics are out-of-equilibrium systems in which energy injection at the microscale drives emergent collective behaviors, from spontaneous flows to active turbulence. While the dynamics of these systems have been extensively studied,…
Biomolecular condensates formed through the phase separation of proteins and nucleic acids are widely observed, offering a fundamental means of organizing intracellular materials in a membrane-less fashion. Traditionally, these condensates…
Biomolecular condensates in cells are often rich in catalytically-active enzymes. This is particularly true in the case of the large enzymatic complexes known as metabolons, which contain different enzymes that participate in the same…
Phase separation and transitions among different molecular states are ubiquitous in living cells. Such transitions can be governed by local equilibrium thermodynamics or by active processes controlled by biological fuel. It remains largely…
Phase separation into compositionally and physically distinct domains is ubiquitous in (non)living matter ranging from alloys and emulsions to biomolecular condensates in cells. The organization of these domains can be controlled, for…
Membraneless droplets or liquid condensates formed via liquid-liquid phase separation (LLPS) play a pivotal role in cell biology and hold potential for biomedical engineering. While membraneless droplets are often studied in the context of…
Multivalent associative proteins with strong complementary interactions play a crucial role in phase separation of intracellular liquid condensates. We study the internal dynamics of such "bond-network" condensates comprised of two…
The ability to control the crystallization behaviour (including its absence) of particles, be they biomolecules such as globular proteins, inorganic colloids, nanoparticles, or metal atoms in an alloy, is of both fundamental and…
Phase separation within polymer networks plays a central role in shaping the structure and mechanics of both synthetic materials and living cells, including the formation of biomolecular condensates within cytoskeletal networks. Previous…
Interactions among biologically active agents is facilitated by their self-generated chemical and hydrodynamic fields. In order to elucidate the pair-wise interactions between such micro-organisms, we employ active droplets as a model…
There is increasing evidence that protein binding to specific sites along DNA can activate the reading out of genetic information without coming into direct physical contact with the gene. There also is evidence that these distant but…
Evidence accumulated over the past decade provides support for liquid-liquid phase separation as the mechanism underlying the formation of biomolecular condensates, which include not only membraneless organelles such as nucleoli and RNA…
Phase separating systems that are maintained away from thermodynamic equilibrium via molecular processes represent a class of active systems, which we call active emulsions. These systems are driven by external energy input for example…
Droplet formation has emerged as an essential concept for the spatiotemporal organisation of biomolecules in cells. However, classical descriptions of droplet dynamics based on passive liquid-liquid phase separation cannot capture the…