SOft MAtter Theory Group Meeting @ SU

Fall 2011


Group meeting coordinator: Lisa Manning (return to Manning group website)
Time
Mondays from 10:30am-11:45pm

Place
PB208

Speaker Schedule:
(note: we will be strict on the time limits for each speaker)
Date 30 miutes 10 minutes 1 10 minutes 2
12-Sep Lisa Manning discussion of meeting format  
19-Sep Alan Middleton Xu Ma Shiladitya Banerjee 
26-Sep Jorge Lopez Yaouen Fily Mark Bowick
3-Oct David M. Jen Schwarz Bryce
10-Oct Moumita Das Duan Duan Wan Cristina
17-Oct Zhenwei Yao Sean Sweeney Silke Henkes
24-Oct Xu Ma Shiladitya Banerjee Arun Ramachandran
31-Oct Yaouen Fily Lisa Manning Tao Zhang
7-Nov Jen Schwarz Bryce Cristina Marchetti
14-Nov Duan Duan Wan Mark Bowick Alan Middleton
  Thanksgiving break    
28-Nov Sean Sweeney Silke Henkes Moumita Das
5-Dec Shiladitya Banerjee Arun Ramachandran David M.
12-Dec Mark Bowick Tao Zhang Jorge Lopez
  Winter Break    

Date 30 miutes 10 minutes 1 10 minutes 2
23-Jan Cristina Lisa Manning Zhenwei Yao
30-Jan Silke Henkes Alan Middleton Xu Ma
6-Feb Liang Cao Moumita Das Yaouen Fily
13-Feb Guest seminar: Dapeng Bi, Brandeis University
Stress fluctuations in shear jammed granular materials
A wide range of systems including granular materials, colloidal suspensions and glassy molecular systems can undergo a process known as the jamming transition. This is the transition between a fluid-like state (un-jammed) and a solid-like state (jammed). The jamming concept has gathered intense research interests in recent years. In the jamming phase diagram proposed by Liu & Nagel for athermal systems, jamming is induced only through compression, and jammed states exist above a critical density. Recent experiments in frictional disks clearly show shear induced jamming. In my talk, I will explore the various features of these new jammed states. I will also present a statistical ensemble based approach which takes into account unique properties of shear-jammed states as well as the strict constraint set by jamming in general. Local stress distributions predicted from this theoretical framework will be compared with experimental data.
20-Feb March meeting practice    
27-Feb March meeting    
5-Mar Guest seminar: Ana Hocevar, Jozef Stefan Institute
Space-filling problems in simple animal tissues
We theoretically investigate simple animal tissues and cell aggregates using the elastomechanical theory of phospholipid vesicles based on vesicle bending energy and a model intermembrane adhesion energy. We first study the one-cell-thick epithelium tissue whose en face view resembles a polygonal tiling. We show that the structure of simple epithelia can be explained by an equilibrium model where energy-degenerate polygons in an entropy-maximizing tiling are described by a single geometric parameter that encodes their roundedness . Both the ordered and the disordered tilings found numerically closely reproduce the patterns observed in Drosophila, Hydra, and Xenopus. This model is free of a specific cell self-energy, cell-cell interaction, and cell division kinetics, and thus provides an insight into the universality of living and inanimate two-dimensional cellular structures. We also study periodic three-dimensional assemblies of identical lipid vesicles as models of simple bulk tissues. In this theory, each vesicle is represented as a convex polyhedron with flat faces, rounded edges, and rounded vertices. In the limit of strong adhesion, the minimal- energy shape of cells minimizes the weighted total edge length. We compare several candidate space-filling polyhedra to find that the oblate shapes are preferred over prolate shapes for all volume-to-surface ratios. The model is then extended to aggregates of vesicles whose adhesion strength on lateral faces is different from that on basal and apical faces. In addition, we study gastrulation, a morphogenetic process that takes place during embryonic development of animals. We focus on gastrulation in Drosophila melanogaster and use a simple two-dimensional model based on undifferentiated cells of identical properties whose energy resides in their membrane. Numerical results reproduce the experimentally observed invagination.
12-Mar Spring break    
19-Mar Tao Zhang David Mayett Jen Schwarz
26-Mar Sven Wijtmans Jorge Lopez Duanduan Wan
2-Apr Xingbo Yang Zhenwei Yao Sean Sweeney
9-Apr Dhagash Bharatbhai Mehta Xu Ma Shiladitya Banerjee
16-Apr Lisa Manning Yaouen Fily Mark Bowick
23-Apr Cancelled
30-Apr Alan Middleton Jen Schwarz Cristina Marchetti
7-May Moumita Das Duanduan Wan Silke Henkes
14-May David Mayett Sean Sweeney Liang Cao

Questions? Want to be added to the list? Email Lisa Manning at mmanning at syr.edu