Related papers: Formation of polymer brushes
Brushes formed by arm-tethered starlike polyelectrolytes may exhibit internal segregation into weakly and strongly extended populations (stratified two-layer structure) when strong ionic intermolecular repulsions induce stretching of the…
Conformation-dependent design of polymer sequences can be considered as a tool to control macromolecular self-assembly. We consider the monomer unit sequences created via the modification of polymers in a homogeneous melt in accordance with…
We study experimentally the fracture mechanisms of a model cohesive granular medium consisting of glass beads held together by solidified polymer bridges. The elastic response of this material can be controlled by changing the cross-linking…
Molecular dynamics simulations of a short-chain polymer melt between two brush-covered surfaces under shear have been performed. The end-grafted polymers which constitute the brush have the same chemical properties as the free chains in the…
Unstable systems of fluidized grains in a very-narrow vertical tube can auto-defluidize after some time, the settling particles forming either a glass- or crystal-like structure. We carried out experiments using different polymer spheres,…
We study gelation in suspensions of model colloidal particles with short-ranged attractive and long-ranged repulsive interactions by means of three-dimensional fluorescence confocal microscopy. At low packing fractions, particles form…
We present a theoretical model for predicting the phase behavior of polymer solutions in which phase separation competes with oligomerization. Specifically, we consider scenarios in which the assembly of polymer chains into stoichiometric…
The buckling of a soft elastic sample under growth or swelling has highlighted a new interest in materials science, morphogenesis, and biology or physiology. Indeed, the change of mass or volume is a common fact of any living species, and…
The stretching of brushes of long polymers grafted to a planar surface is investigated byMonte Carlo simulations in the limit of very high grafting densities, as achieved in recent experiments. The monomer density profiles are shown to…
This study reports a general scenario for the out-of-equilibrium features of collapsing polymeric architectures. We use molecular dynamics simulations to characterize the coarsening kinetics, in bad solvent, for several macromolecular…
The structure and mechanical properties of a simple two-dimensional model of a cohesive powder are investigated by molecular dynamics simulations. Micromechanical ingredients involve elasticity, friction, a short range attraction and,…
We examine the dynamics of two-dimensional colloidal systems using numerical simulations of a system with a drive applied to a thin region in the middle of the sample to produce a local shear. For a monodisperse colloidal assembly, we find…
Sphere-patterned ultrathin block copolymers films are potentially interesting for a variety of applications in nanotechnology. We use self-consistent field theory to investigate the elastic response of sphere monolayer films with respect to…
The stretching of a polymer chain by a large scale chaotic flow is considered. The steady state which emerges as a balance of the turbulent stretching and anharmonic resistance of the chain is quantitatively described, i.e. the dependency…
Elastomers are used in a wide range of applications because of their large strain to failure, low density, and tailorable stiffness and toughness. The mechanical behavior of elastomers derives mainly from the entropic elasticity of the…
We use numerical simulations to study the dynamics of dense assemblies of self-propelled particles in the limit of extremely large, but finite, persistence times. In this limit, the system evolves intermittently between mechanical…
Non equilibrium coarse grained, dissipative particle dynamics simulations of complex fluids, made up of polymer brushes tethered to planar surfaces immersed in a solvent yield non monotonic behavior of the friction coefficient as a function…
Mesh-like structures, such as mucus gel or cytoskeleton networks, are ubiquitous in biological systems. These intricate structures are composed of cross-linked, semi-flexible bio-filaments, crucial to numerous biological processes. In many…
We investigate the motion of two overlapping polymers with self-avoidance confined in a narrow 2d box. A statistical model is constructed using blob free-energy arguments. We find spontaneous segregation under the condition: $L > R_{//}$,…
Although buckling is a prime route to achieve functionalization and synthesis of single colloids, buckling of colloidal structures---made up of multiple colloids---remains poorly studied. Here, we investigate the buckling of the simplest…