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Active particles under soft confinement such as droplets or vesicles present intriguing phenomena, as collective motion emerges alongside the deformation of the environment. A model is employed to systematically investigate droplet…
The field of synthetic active matter has, thus far, been led by efforts to create point-like, isolated (yet interacting) self-propelled objects (\emph{e.g.} colloids, droplets, microrobots) and understanding their collective dynamics. The…
Active fluid droplets are a class of soft materials exhibiting autonomous motion sustained by an energy supply. Such systems have been shown to capture motility regimes typical of biological cells and are ideal candidates as building-block…
Motion control of droplets has generated much attention for its applications to microfluidics, where precise control of small fluid volumes is an imperative requirement. Mechanical vibrations have been shown to be effective at inducing…
Recently, there is much interest in droplet condensation on soft or liquid/liquid-like substrates. Droplets can deform soft and liquid interfaces resulting in a wealth of phenomena not observed on hard, solid surfaces (e.g., increased…
Active droplets are artificial microswimmers built from a liquid dispersion by microfluidic tools and showing self-propelled motion. These systems hold particular interest for mimicking biological phenomena, such as some aspects of cell…
Nature is remarkably adept at using interfaces to build structures, encapsulate reagents, and regulate biological processes. Inspired by Nature, we describe flexible polymer-based ribbons, termed "mesoscale polymers" (MSPs), to modulate…
Droplet motion on surfaces influences phenomena as diverse as microfluidic liquid handling, printing technology and micro-organism migration. Typically, droplet motion is achieved by inducing energy gradients on a substrate or flow on the…
Self-propelling active matter relies on the conversion of energy from the undirected, nanoscopic scale to directed, macroscopic motion. One of the challenges in the design of synthetic active matter lies in the control of dynamic states, or…
We study theoretically the hydrodynamics of a fluid drop containing oriented filaments endowed with active contractile or extensile stresses and placed on a solid surface. The active stresses alter qualitatively the wetting properties of…
Controlling the shape and position of moving and pinned droplets on a solid surface is an important feature often found in microfluidic applications. However, automating them, e.g., for high-throughput applications, does rarely involve…
Micro/nanoliter droplet is capable of achieving versatile applications with tiny volume and substantial surface energy, which is a big plus over bulk liquid. Yet, the contradiction of elaborate manipulation and enough power is still a…
Active drops refer to drops with the ability to self-migrate: these drops typically attain this ability by virtue of containing of active particles that derive energy from their environment and undergo directed motion inside the drops,…
We use molecular dynamics simulations to study the evaporation of particle-laden droplets on a heated surface. The droplets are composed of a Lennard-Jones fluid containing rigid particles which are spherical sections of an atomic lattice,…
In the last years self-motile droplets attracted the attention of scientists from different fields ranging from applied biology to theoretical physics, because of their promising technological applications and important biological…
Intelligent soft matter stands at the intersection of materials science, physics, and cognitive science, promising to change how we design and interact with materials. This transformative field seeks to create materials that possess…
Living materials adapt their shape to signals from the environment, yet the impact of shape changes on signal processing and associated feedback dynamics remain unclear. We find that droplets with signal-responsive interfacial tensions…
We investigate the collective dynamics of self-propelled droplets, confined in a one dimensional micro-fluidic channel. On one hand, neighboring droplets align and form large trains of droplets moving in the same direction. On the other…
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…
Recent works demonstrated that fiber arrays may constitue the basis of an open digital microfluidics. Various processes, such as droplet motion, fragmentation, trapping, release, mixing and encapsulation, may be achieved on fiber arrays.…