495 research outputs found
Deformation of Equilibrium Shape of a Vesicle Induced by Injected Flexible Polymers
Using field theoretic approach, we study equilibrium shape deformation of a
vesicle induced by the presence of enclosed flexible polymers, which is a
simple model of drug delivery system or endocytosis. To evaluate the total free
energy of this system, it is necessary to calculate the bending elastic energy
of the membrane, the conformation entropy of the polymers and their
interactions. For this purpose, we combine phase field theory for the membrane
and self-consistent field theory for the polymers. Simulations on this coupled
model system for axiosymmetric shapes show a shape deformation of the vesicle
induced by introducing polymers into it. We examined the dependence of the
stability of the vesicle shape on the chain length of the polymers and the
packing ratio of the vesicle. We present a simple model calculation that shows
the relative stability of the prolate shape compared to the oblate shape.Comment: 5 pages, 3 figure
Coarsening Dynamics of a One-Dimensional Driven Cahn-Hilliard System
We study the one-dimensional Cahn-Hilliard equation with an additional
driving term representing, say, the effect of gravity. We find that the driving
field has an asymmetric effect on the solution for a single stationary
domain wall (or `kink'), the direction of the field determining whether the
analytic solutions found by Leung [J.Stat.Phys.{\bf 61}, 345 (1990)] are
unique. The dynamics of a kink-antikink pair (`bubble') is then studied. The
behaviour of a bubble is dependent on the relative sizes of a characteristic
length scale , where is the driving field, and the separation, ,
of the interfaces. For the velocities of the interfaces are
negligible, while in the opposite limit a travelling-wave solution is found
with a velocity . For this latter case () a set of
reduced equations, describing the evolution of the domain lengths, is obtained
for a system with a large number of interfaces, and implies a characteristic
length scale growing as . Numerical results for the domain-size
distribution and structure factor confirm this behavior, and show that the
system exhibits dynamical scaling from very early times.Comment: 20 pages, revtex, 10 figures, submitted to Phys. Rev.
Dispersive stabilization of the inverse cascade for the Kolmogorov flow
It is shown by perturbation techniques and numerical simulations that the
inverse cascade of kink-antikink annihilations, characteristic of the
Kolmogorov flow in the slightly supercritical Reynolds number regime, is halted
by the dispersive action of Rossby waves in the beta-plane approximation. For
beta tending to zero, the largest excited scale is proportional to the
logarithm of one over beta and differs strongly from what is predicted by
standard dimensional phenomenology which ignores depletion of nonlinearity.Comment: 4 pages, LATEX, 3 figures. v3: revised version with minor correction
Scale invariance in coarsening of binary and ternary fluids
Phase separation in binary and ternary fluids is studied using a two
dimensional Lattice Gas Automata. The lengths, given by the the first zero
crossing point of the correlation function and the total interface length is
shown to exhibit power law dependence on time. In binary mixtures, our data
clearly indicate the existence of a regime having more than one length scale
where the coarsening process proceeds through the rupture and reassociation of
domains. In ternary fluids; in the case of symmetric mixtures there exists a
regime with a single length scale having dynamic exponent 1/2, while in
asymmetric mixtures our data establish the break down of scale invariance.Comment: 20 pages, 13 figure
Lattice-Gas Simulations of Minority-Phase Domain Growth in Binary Immiscible and Ternary Amphiphilic Fluid
We investigate the growth kinetics of binary immiscible fluids and emulsions
in two dimensions using a hydrodynamic lattice-gas model. We perform
off-critical quenches in the binary fluid case and find that the domain size
within the minority phase grows algebraically with time in accordance with
theoretical predictions. In the late time regime we find a growth exponent n =
0.45 over a wide range of concentrations, in good agreement with other
simluations. In the early time regime we find no universal growth exponent but
a strong dependence on the concentration of the minority phase. In the ternary
amphiphilic fluid case the kinetics of self assembly of the droplet phase are
studied for the first time. At low surfactant concentrations, we find that,
after an early algebraic growth, a nucleation regime dominates the late-time
kinetics, which is enhanced by an increasing concentration of surfactant. With
a further increase in the concentration of surfactant, we see a crossover to
logarithmically slow growth, and finally saturation of the oil droplets, which
we fit phenomenologically to a stretched exponential function. Finally, the
transition between the droplet and the sponge phase is studied.Comment: 22 pages, 13 figures, submitted to PR
Elastic deformation of a fluid membrane upon colloid binding
When a colloidal particle adheres to a fluid membrane, it induces elastic
deformations in the membrane which oppose its own binding. The structural and
energetic aspects of this balance are theoretically studied within the
framework of a Helfrich Hamiltonian. Based on the full nonlinear shape
equations for the membrane profile, a line of continuous binding transitions
and a second line of discontinuous envelopment transitions are found, which
meet at an unusual triple point. The regime of low tension is studied
analytically using a small gradient expansion, while in the limit of large
tension scaling arguments are derived which quantify the asymptotic behavior of
phase boundary, degree of wrapping, and energy barrier. The maturation of
animal viruses by budding is discussed as a biological example of such
colloid-membrane interaction events.Comment: 14 pages, 9 figures, REVTeX style, follow-up on cond-mat/021242
Topography and instability of monolayers near domain boundaries
We theoretically study the topography of a biphasic surfactant monolayer in
the vicinity of domain boundaries. The differing elastic properties of the two
phases generally lead to a nonflat topography of ``mesas'', where domains of
one phase are elevated with respect to the other phase. The mesas are steep but
low, having heights of up to 10 nm. As the monolayer is laterally compressed,
the mesas develop overhangs and eventually become unstable at a surface tension
of about K(dc)^2 (dc being the difference in spontaneous curvature and K a
bending modulus). In addition, the boundary is found to undergo a
topography-induced rippling instability upon compression, if its line tension
is smaller than about K(dc). The effect of diffuse boundaries on these features
and the topographic behavior near a critical point are also examined. We
discuss the relevance of our findings to several experimental observations
related to surfactant monolayers: (i) small topographic features recently found
near domain boundaries; (ii) folding behavior observed in mixed phospholipid
monolayers and model lung surfactants; (iii) roughening of domain boundaries
seen under lateral compression; (iv) the absence of biphasic structures in
tensionless surfactant films.Comment: 17 pages, 9 figures, using RevTeX and epsf, submitted to Phys Rev
Genetic dissection of photoperiod response based on GWAS of pre-anthesis phase duration in spring barley
Heading time is a complex trait, and natural variation in photoperiod responses is a major factor controlling time to heading, adaptation and grain yield. In barley, previous heading time studies have been mainly conducted under field conditions to measure total days to heading. We followed a novel approach and studied the natural variation of time to heading in a world-wide spring barley collection (218 accessions), comprising of 95 photoperiod-sensitive (Ppd-H1) and 123 accessions with reduced photoperiod sensitivity (ppd-H1) to long-day (LD) through dissecting pre-anthesis development into four major stages and sub-phases. The study was conducted under greenhouse (GH) conditions (LD; 16/8 h; ∼20/∼16°C day/night). Genotyping was performed using a genome-wide high density 9K single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) chip which assayed 7842 SNPs. We used the barley physical map to identify candidate genes underlying genome-wide association scans (GWAS). GWAS for pre-anthesis stages/sub-phases in each photoperiod group provided great power for partitioning genetic effects on floral initiation and heading time. In addition to major genes known to regulate heading time under field conditions, several novel QTL with medium to high effects, including new QTL having major effects on developmental stages/sub-phases were found to be associated in this study. For example, highly associated SNPs tagged the physical regions around HvCO1 (barley CONSTANS1) and BFL (BARLEY FLORICAULA/LEAFY) genes. Based upon our GWAS analysis, we propose a new genetic network model for each photoperiod group, which includes several newly identified genes, such as several HvCO-like genes, belonging to different heading time pathways in barley
Lattice-gas simulations of Domain Growth, Saturation and Self-Assembly in Immiscible Fluids and Microemulsions
We investigate the dynamical behavior of both binary fluid and ternary
microemulsion systems in two dimensions using a recently introduced
hydrodynamic lattice-gas model of microemulsions. We find that the presence of
amphiphile in our simulations reduces the usual oil-water interfacial tension
in accord with experiment and consequently affects the non-equilibrium growth
of oil and water domains. As the density of surfactant is increased we observe
a crossover from the usual two-dimensional binary fluid scaling laws to a
growth that is {\it slow}, and we find that this slow growth can be
characterized by a logarithmic time scale. With sufficient surfactant in the
system we observe that the domains cease to grow beyond a certain point and we
find that this final characteristic domain size is inversely proportional to
the interfacial surfactant concentration in the system.Comment: 28 pages, latex, embedded .eps figures, one figure is in colour, all
in one uuencoded gzip compressed tar file, submitted to Physical Review
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