Related papers: Formation and Interaction of Membrane Tubes
Shape transformations of epithelial tissues in three dimensions, which are crucial for embryonic development or in vitro organoid growth, can result from active forces generated within the cytoskeleton of the epithelial cells. How the…
A microfluidic device is constructed from PDMS with a single channel having a short section that is a thin flexible membrane, in order to investigate the complex fluid-structure interaction that arises between a flowing fluid and a…
The biopolymers actin and microtubules are often in an ongoing assembling/disassembling state far from thermal equilibrium. Above a critical density this leads to spatially periodic patterns, as shown by a scaling argument and in terms of a…
We study theoretically the shapes of biological tubes affected by various pathologies. When epithelial cells grow at an uncontrolled rate, the negative tension produced by their division provokes a buckling instability. Several shapes are…
Recent experiments by Kantsler et. al. (2007) have shown that the relaxational dynamics of a vesicle in external elongation flow is accompanied by the formation of wrinkles on a membrane. Motivated by these experiments we present a theory…
We investigate the steady states and dynamical instabilities resulting from ``particles'' depositing on (fusion) and pinching off (fission) a fluid membrane. These particles could be either small lipid vesicles or isolated proteins. In the…
We study a membrane tube with unidirectional ion pumps driving an osmotic pressure difference. A pressure driven peristaltic instability is identified, qualitatively distinct from similar tension-driven Rayleigh type instabilities on…
During development, embryos perform a mesmerizing choreography, which is crucial for the correct shaping, positioning and function of all organs. The cellular properties powering animal morphogenesis have been the focus of much attention.…
Cells modify their volume in response to changes in osmotic pressure but it is usually assumed that other active shape variations do not involve significant volume fluctuations. Here we report experiments demonstrating that water transport…
Lipid membranes form the barrier between the inside and outside of cells and many of their subcompartments. As such, they bind to a wide variety of nano- and micrometer sized objects and, in the presence of strong adhesive forces, strongly…
We present a novel buckling instability relevant to membrane budding in eukaryotic cells. In this mechanism, curved filaments bind to a lipid bilayer without changing its intrinsic curvature. As more and more filaments adsorb, newly added…
We systematically explore the self-assembly of semi-flexible polymers in deformable spherical confinement across a wide regime of chain stiffness, contour lengths and packing fractions by means of coarse-grained molecular dynamics…
A framework is presented for understanding the common character of proteins. Proteins are linear chain molecules. However, the simple model of a polymer viewed as spheres tethered together does not account for many of the observed…
From the Golgi apparatus to endosomes, organelles in the endomembrane system exhibit complex and varied morphologies that are often related to their function. Such membrane-bound organelles operate far from equilibrium due to directed…
We investigate the mechanism by which topological defects form in first order phase transitions with a charged order parameter. We show how thick superconductor vortices and heavy cosmic strings form by trapping of magnetic flux. In an…
An accurate experimental and theoretical study has been performed about a phenomenon, not previously reported in the literature, occurring in highly viscous liquids: the formation of a definite pipe structure induced by the passage of a…
The magnetic nature of the formation of solar active regions lies at the heart of understanding solar activity and, in particular, solar eruptions. A widespread model, used in many theoretical studies, simulations and the interpretation of…
The self-organization of proteins into enriched compartments and the formation of complex patterns are crucial processes for life on the cellular level. Liquid-liquid phase separation is one mechanism for forming such enriched compartments.…
In development and homeostasis, multi-cellular systems exhibit spatial and temporal heterogeneity in their biochemical and mechanical properties. Nevertheless, it remains unclear how spatiotemporally heterogeneous forces affect the…
Utilising Onsager's variational formulation, we derive dynamical equations for the relaxation of a fluid membrane tube in the limit of small deformation, allowing for a contrast of solvent viscosity across the membrane and variations in…