Related papers: Mechanical limits of viral capsids
This paper deals with the theoretical and numerical analysis of dynamic fracture of dissimilar chain consisting of masses lined by springs. Such a structure exhibits quite different dynamic properties in comparison with a symmetrical…
We examine the fracture mechanics of tearing graphene. We present a molecular dynamics simulation of the propagation of cracks in clamped, free-standing graphene as a function of the out-of-plane force. The geometry is motivated by…
Two dimensional simulations of non-cohesive granular matter in a biaxial shear tester are discussed. The effect of particle elasticity on the mechanical behavior is investigated using two complementary distinct element methods (DEM): Soft…
Recent progress in approaches to determine the elastic constants of solids starting from the microscopic particle interactions is reviewed. On the theoretical side, density functional theory approaches are discussed and compared to more…
We investigate the elastic buckling of a triangular prism made of a soft elastomer. A face of the prism is bonded to a stiff slab that imposes an average axial compression. We observe two possible buckling modes which are localized along…
We present the results from a numerical investigation using the finite element method to study the buckling strength of near-perfect spherical shells containing a single, localized, Gaussian-dimple defect whose profile is systematically…
Single molecule experiments on bacteriophages show an exponential scaling for the dependence of mobility on the length of DNA within the capsid. It has been suggested that this could be due to the "capstan mechanism" -- the exponential…
The native structures of proteins, except for notable exceptions of intrinsically disordered proteins, in general take their most stable conformation in the physiological condition to maintain their structural framework so that their…
Over the last half-century, linear viscoelastic models for crack growth in soft solids have flourished but their predictions have rarely been compared to experiments. In fact, most available models are either very approximate or cast in…
Composite materials are often stronger than their constituents. We demonstrate this through a spring network model on a square lattice. Two different types of sites (A and B) are distributed randomly on the lattice, representing two…
We propose a simple mathematical model to describe the mechanical relaxation of cells within a curved epithelial tissue layer represented by an arbitrary curve in two-dimensional space. This model generalises previous one-dimensional models…
The complexity of the frictional dynamics at the microscopic scale makes difficult to identify all of its controlling parameters. Indeed, experiments on sheared elastic bodies have shown that the static friction coefficient depends on…
We carry out Monte Carlo simulations of a colloidal fluid membrane composed of chiral rod-like viruses. The membrane is modeled by a triangular mesh of beads connected by bonds in which the bonds and beads are free to move at each Monte…
Predicting the mechanical response of the soft gel materials under external deformation is of paramount importance in many areas, such as foods, pharmaceuticals, solid-liquid separations, cosmetics, aerogels and drug delivery. Most of the…
We show numerically that the response of simple amorphous solids (elastic networks and particle packings) to a local force dipole is characterized by a lengthscale $\ell_c$ that diverges as unjamming is approached as $\ell_c \sim (z -…
We determine stability boundaries for the wrinkling of highly uni-directionally stretched, finely thin, rectangular elastic sheets. For a given fine thickness and length, a stability boundary here is a curve in the parameter plane, aspect…
Force-induced reversible transformations between coiled and normal polymorphs of bacterial flagella have been observed in recent optical-tweezer experiment. We introduce a discrete elastic rod model with two competing helical states…
We address the flutter instability of a flexible plate immersed in an axial flow. This instability is similar to flag flutter and results from the competition between destabilising pressure forces and stabilising bending stiffness. In…
We study, both theoretically and numerically, the equilibrium of a hinged rigid leaflet with an attached rotational spring, immersed in a stationary incompressible fluid within a rigid channel. Through a careful investigation of the…
Extreme deformation of soft matter is central to our understanding of the effects of shock, fracture, and phase change in a variety of systems. Yet, despite, the increasing interest in this area, far-from-equilibrium behaviours of soft…