Conveners
W3-8 Soft Condensed Matter II (DCMMP) | Matière condensée molle II (DPMCM)
- John Dutcher
Thin polymeric films have important applications including coatings for microelectronic devices. To study these nanoscale systems, we investigate the deformation of a floating glassy film where the inclusion of a liquid/solid contact line on top of the floating film introduces a capillary tug. The system is constructed by preparing a nanometric glassy film, which floats atop a thin supported...
When a droplet interacts with a soft surface, it can deform the material it contacts. This property leads to a plethora of unique physical phenomena with applications in fields ranging from water collection to surface sensing. We explore droplet dynamics on soft materials using a micropipette-based technique to simultaneously image, and measure the forces on, a microscopic droplet dragged...
The dispersion and orientation of nanorods in a polymeric matrix have a direct impact on the mechanical and physical properties of the final material. Our molecular dynamics simulations show a direct relationship between the concentration and the order of the system when rod-polymer attractive interactions are applied. At lower concentrations, nematic droplets of nanorods form while at higher...
We examine the phase behaviour of blends composed of complementary diblock copolymers, one with composition f and the other with composition 1-f. Self-consistent field theory (SCFT) calculations have predicted a Lifshitz critical point in this system at f=0.21. This is a special point where uniform and modulated ordered phases meet the disordered phase. However, Lifshitz critical points are...
Phytoglycogen (PG) is a naturally occurring, highly branched, glucose dendrimer that is extracted from sweet corn as soft, compact nanoparticles [1]. We use dynamical self-consistent field theory (dSCFT) to simulate the dynamical evolution of a PG nanoparticle solubilized in water. We evolve the 11-generation dendrimer using an efficient, stable operator decomposition of the dendrimer into its...
