Related papers: Electromechanical Limits of Polymersomes
A series of amphiphilic LC block copolymers, in which the hydrophobic block is a smectic polymer poly(4-methoxyphenyl 4-(6-acryloyloxy-hexyloxy)-benzoate) (PA6ester1) and the hydrophilic block is polyethyleneglycol (PEG), were synthesized…
A non-contact scanning-probe-microscopy method was used to probe local near-surface dielectric susceptibility and dielectric relaxation in poly-vinyl-acetate (PVAc) near the glass transition. Dielectric spectra were measured from 10-4 Hz to…
Experimental results from mechanical viscoelastic as well as dielectric relaxation times were compared to theoretical expectations utilizing polymer scaling theory. Viscoelastic relaxation of a hydrogel at 33% relative humidity fabricated…
Traditional plastics demand a choice between durability (thermosets) and reprocessability (thermoplastics). Vitrimers are a recent class of polymer network combining both these qualities. Their increased cost of production can be offset by…
This paper reviews the research work on the liquid crystalline (LC) polymer vesicles (polymersomes), where the thermotropic nematic and smectic phases are displayed in the lyotropic bilayer polymer membrane. LC polymersomes possess the…
Contrary to existing theoretical models, experimental evidence points out that electroporation (membrane defect formation under external electric fields) starts to occur within the range of transmembrane voltages that cells may routinely…
This paper considers the effect of electrostatics on the stability of a charged membrane. We show that at low ionic strength and high surface charge density, repulsion between charges on the membrane renders it unstable to the formation of…
Understanding dynamic and complex interaction of biological membranes with extracellular matrices plays a crucial role in controlling a variety of cell behavior and functions, from cell adhesion and growth to signaling and differentiation.…
During the melting transition of dimyristoyl phosphatidylglycerol (DMPG), the order of the lipid chains and the three-dimensional, vesicular structural arrangement change simultaneously. These changes result in peculiar heat capacity…
The elasticity of disordered and polydisperse polymer networks is a fundamental problem of soft matter physics that is still open. Here, we self-assemble polymer networks via simulations of a mixture of bivalent and tri- or tetravalent…
The coupling of electric fields to the mechanics of lipid membranes gives rise to intriguing electromechanical behavior, as, for example, evidenced by the deformation of lipid vesicles in external electric fields. Electromechanical effects…
We investigate the stability of a circular electrodes-coated dielectric membrane under the combined action of an electric field and all-round in-plane tension. It is known that such a membrane is susceptible to the limiting point…
In frameworks of the scaling theory of phase transitions and critical phenomena the quantitative dependence of macroscopic properties on nanostructural parameters in a polymeric material is revealed. The draw ratios at neck and at break are…
Nanocomposite materials made of block copolymer and nanoparticles display properties which can be different from the purely polymeric matrix. The resulting material is a crossover of the original properties of the block copolymer and the…
Two-dimensional (2D) electronic materials are of significant technological interest due to their exceptional properties and broad applicability in engineering. The transition from nanoscale physics, that dictates their stable…
Polymorphic solids of the same chemical composition can have different atomic structures; in each polymorph atoms vibrate around a local potential energy minimum (LPEM). If transformations to other structures have sufficiently high enthalpy…
An elastic membrane that is forced to reside in a container smaller than its natural size will deform and, upon further volume reduction, eventually crumple. The crumpled state is characterized by the localization of energy in a complex…
In this article we study the effect of a delta-interaction on a polymerized membrane of arbitrary internal dimension D. Depending on the dimensionality of membrane and embedding space, different physical scenarios are observed. We emphasize…
We discuss in this paper the phase diagram of a diblock polyampholyte solution in the limit of high ionic strength as a function of concentration and charge asymmetry. This system is shown to be very similar to solutions of so-called…
A cell dynamics method for domain separation of diblock copolymers (DBCPs) interacting with nanoparticles (NPs) whose diffusion coefficients depend on chain configuration is proposed for self-assembly of DBCP/NP composites. Increasing NP…