Related papers: Formation of polymer brushes
Process of stripe formation is analyzed numerically in a binary mixture. The system consists of particles of two sizes, without any direct mutual interactions. Overlapping of large particles, surrounded by a dense system of smaller…
We explore the Mode I fracture toughness of a polymer gel containing a semi-infinite, growing crack. First, an expression is derived for the energy release rate within the linearized, small-strain setting. This expression reveals a crack…
In this thesis we deal with the specific collective phenomena in condensed matter - striped-structures formation. Such structures are observed in different branches of condensed matter physics, like surface physics or physics of…
Engineered bacteria in which motility is reduced by local cell density generate periodic stripes of high and low density when spotted on agar plates. We study theoretically the origin and mechanism of this process in a kinetic model that…
A Brownian dynamics algorithm is used to describe the static behaviour of associative polymer solutions. Predictions for the fractions of stickers bound by intra-chain and inter-chain association, as a function of system parameters, such as…
From glycosylated cell surfaces to sterically stabilized liposomes, polymers attached to membranes attract biological and therapeutic interest. Can the scaling laws of polymer "brushes" describe the physical properties of these coats? We…
We analyze the nonequilibrium dynamics of single inextensible semiflexible biopolymers as stretching forces are applied at the ends. Based on different (contradicting) heuristic arguments, various scaling laws have been proposed for the…
We develop an energy-landscape based elasto-plastic model to understand the behaviour of amorphous solids under uniform and cyclic shear. Amorphous solids are modeled as being composed of mesoscopic sub-volumes, each of which may occupy…
We present molecular dynamics simulations of a simple model for polymer melts with intramolecular barriers. We investigate structural relaxation as a function of the barrier strength. Dynamic correlators can be consistently analyzed within…
Many biological processes are supported by special molecules, called motor proteins or molecular motors, that transport cellular cargoes along linear protein filaments and can reversibly associate to their tracks. Stimulated by these…
Mechanical densification of granular bodies is a process in which a loose material becomes increasingly cohesive as the applied pressure increases. A constitutive description of this process faces the formidable problem that granular and…
The shape of a polymer plays an important role in determining its interactions with other molecules and with the environment, and is in turn affected by both of them. As a consequence, in the literature the shape properties of a chain in…
Liquid crystalline polymers are materials of considerable scientific interest and technological value to society [1-3]. An important subset of such materials exhibit rubber-like elasticity; these can combine the remarkable optical…
Using a recently developed continuum theory of dislocation dynamics, we derive three new predictions about plasticity and grain boundary formation in crystals. (1) There will be a residual stress jump across grain boundaries and…
Localized contractile configurations or asters spontaneously appear and disappear as emergent structures in the collective stochastic dynamics of active polar actomyosin filaments. Passive parti- cles which (un)bind to the active filaments…
We enumerate all minimal energy packings (MEPs) for small single linear and ring polymers composed of spherical monomers with contact attractions and hard-core repulsions, and compare them to corresponding results for monomer packings. We…
We perform traction experiments on viscous liquids highly confined between parallel plates, a geometry known as the probe-tack test in the adhesion community. Direct observation during the experiment coupled to force measurement shows the…
In this paper, we construct under general assumptions the stochastic dynamics of an interacting particle system in a bounded domain $\Omega$ with sticky boundary. Under appropriate conditions on the interaction the constructed process…
Network formation of associative semiflexible fibers and mixtures of fibers and colloidal particles is simulated for the Johnson-Kendall-Roberts (JKR) model of elastic contacts, and a phase diagram in terms of particle elasticity and…
Spontaneous self-assembly in molecular systems is a fundamental route to both biological and engineered soft matter. Simple micellisation, emulsion formation, and polymer mixing principles are well understood. However, the principles behind…