Related papers: Local composition controls pattern formation in co…
Chemical activity is known to affect phase coexistence and coarsening in liquid mixtures, most commonly through reaction-induced changes of intermolecular interactions. Here, we analyze a scenario in which chemical reactions regulate…
Emulsions ripen with an average droplet size increasing in time. In chemically active emulsions, coarsening can be absent, leading to a non-equilibrium steady state with mono-disperse droplet sizes. By considering a minimal model for phase…
An important strategy to stabilize emulsions is to arrest coalescence of the constituent droplets with an opposing rheological force. Colloidal particles adsorbed on the surface of emulsion droplets in a Pickering emulsion become…
Controlling the size of droplets, for example in biological cells, is challenging because large droplets typically outcompete smaller droplets due to surface tension. This coarsening is generally accelerated by hydrodynamic effects, but…
Droplets are essential for spatially controlling biomolecules in cells. To work properly, cells need to control the emergence and morphology of droplets. On the one hand, driven chemical reactions can affect droplets profoundly. For…
Living cells use phase separation and concentration gradients to organize chemical compartments in space. Here, we present a theoretical study of droplet dynamics in gradient systems. We derive the corresponding growth law of droplets and…
Systems containing active components are intrinsically out of equilibrium, while binary mixtures reach their equilibrium configuration when complete phase separation is achieved. Active particles are found to stabilise non-equilibrium…
Phase separation is the thermodynamic process that explains how droplets form in multicomponent fluids. These droplets can provide controlled compartments to localize chemical reactions, and reactions can also affect the droplets' dynamics.…
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…
We propose here a new mechanism of droplet coarsening in phase-separating fluid mixtures. In contrast to the conventional understanding that there are no interactions between droplets in the late stage of spinodal decomposition, we…
Chemically active droplets provide simple models for cell-like systems that can grow and divide. Such active droplet systems are driven away from thermodynamic equilibrium and turn over chemically, which corresponds to a simple metabolism.…
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…
We use direct numerical simulations and scaling arguments to study coarsening in binary fluid mixtures with a conserved order parameter in the droplet-spinodal regime -- the volume fraction of the droplets is neither too small nor symmetric…
Biological cells use droplets to separate components and spatially control their interior. Experiments demonstrate that the complex, crowded cellular environment affects the droplet arrangement and their sizes. To understand this behavior,…
Active fluids operate by constantly dissipating energy at the particle level to perform a directed motion, yielding dynamics and phases without any equilibrium equivalent. The emerging behaviors have been studied extensively, yet…
We study numerically the behaviour of a mixture of a passive isotropic fluid and an active polar gel, in the presence of a surfactant favouring emulsification. Focussing on parameters for which the underlying free energy favours the…
The field of active matter, and particularly active emulsions, is growing rapidly, with significant progress made recently on both theoretical and experimental fronts. Here, we summarize experimental research progress related to active…
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…
Active emulsions and liquid crystalline shells are intriguing and experimentally realisable types of topological matter. Here we numerically study the morphology and spatiotemporal dynamics of a double emulsion, where one or two passive…
We present a generic mechanism by which reproducing microorganisms, with a diffusivity that depends on the local population density, can form stable patterns. It is known that a decrease of swimming speed with density can promote separation…