Related papers: New mechanism for impurity-induced step bunching
Crack growth is the basic mechanism leading to the failure of brittle materials. Engineering addresses this problem within the framework of continuum mechanics, which links deterministically the crack motion to the applied loading. Such an…
The recent discovery of a lateral organization in cell membranes due to small structures called 'rafts' has motivated a lot of biological and physico-chemical studies. A new experiment on a model system has shown a spectacular budding…
The yield behavior of crystalline solids is determined by the motion of defects like dislocations, twin boundaries and coherent phase boundaries. These solids are hardened by introducing precipitates -- small particles of a second phase. It…
Topological defects are crucial to the thermodynamics and structure of condensed matter systems. For instance, when incorporated into crystalline membranes like graphene, disclinations with positive and negative topological charge…
Asymmetries and anisotropies are widespread in biological systems, including in the structure and dynamics of cilia and eukaryotic flagella. These microscopic, hair-like appendages exhibit asymmetric beating patterns that break…
One technique for creating semiconductor crystals with new, desired properties involves replacing some atoms in the crystal lattice with additives - atoms of a different type. This substitution not only alters the bulk properties of the…
We have probed the effects of atomic-scale impurities on superconductivity in Bi_{2}Sr_{2}CaCu_{2}O_{8} by performing low-temperature tunneling spectroscopy measurements with a scanning tunneling microscope. Our results show that…
In the pedestal of a tokamak, the sharp radial gradients of density and temperature can give rise to poloidal variation in the density of impurities. At the same time, the flow of the impurity species is modified relative to the…
This paper investigates faceting mechanisms induced by electromigration in the regime where atomic steps are transparent. For this purpose we study several vicinal orientations by means of in-situ (optical diffraction, electronic…
We present a novel Monte Carlo simulation of the phase separation dynamics of a model fluid membrane. Such a phase segregation induces shape changes of the membrane and results in local `budding' under favourable conditions. We present a…
Active systems are driven out of equilibrium by exchanging energy and momentum with their environment. This endows them with anomalous mechanical properties that we review in this colloquium for the case of dry scalar active matter, which…
Two integrable spin ladder systems with different types of impurities are proposed. The impurities are introduced in such a way that the integrability of the models is not violated. The models are solved exactly and the Bethe ansatz…
We investigate the nonlinear evolution of the Bales-Zangwill instability, responsible for the meandering of atomic steps on a growing vicinal surface. We develop an asymptotic method to derive, in the continuous limit, an evolution equation…
Colonies of rod-shaped bacteria constitute a system of colloidal active matter with nematic properties. As a single initial bacterium multiplies through repeated divisions, the resulting colony quickly loses long-range orientational order,…
We discuss the possibility that, besides roughening, a vicinal surface could display preroughening (PR), and consider the possible mechanisms for its promotion. Within the framework of a terrace-step-kink model, it turns out that a PR…
Drops of active liquid crystal have recently shown the ability to self-propel, which was associated with topological defects in the orientation of active filaments [Sanchez {\em et al.}, Nature {\bf 491}, 431 (2013)]. Here, we study the…
As a method for controlling active materials, researchers have suggested designing patterns of activity on a substrate, which should guide the motion of topological defects. To investigate this concept, we model the behavior of a single…
The coarsening dynamics of three-dimensional islands on a growing film is discussed. It is assumed that the origin of the initial instability of a planar surface is the Ehrlich-Schwoebel step-edge barrier for adatom diffusion. Two…
We study two mobile bosonic impurities immersed in a one-dimensional optical lattice and interacting with a bosonic bath. We employ the exact diagonalization method for small periodic lattices to study stationary properties and dynamics. We…
Proteins are only moderately stable. It has long been debated whether this narrow range of stabilities is solely a result of neutral drift towards lower stability or purifying selection against excess stability is also at work - for which…