Wrinkle formations in axi-symmetrically stretched membranes

We study experimentally the main features of wrinkles that form in an initially stretched and flat elastic membrane when subjected to an axi-symmetric traction force at the center. The wavelength and amplitude of the wrinkle pattern are accurately characterized as the membrane tension and the traction forced are varied. We show that wrinkles are the result of a supercritical instability and appear for a well-defined critical traction force that is a function of the membrane tension. Wrinkle length and amplitude increase as the traction force is increased further. By contrast, both quantities decrease as the membrane tension is increased. Calculations based on symmetry arguments and elastic-energy minimization are in good agreement with experiments and provide a simple way to investigate configurations that are difficult to access experimentally. Such problems include wrinkles in elastic nano-films on finite-thickness viscous substrates used in semiconductor technology or in cellular forces detection.Received: 10 August 2004, Published online: 19 October 2004PACS: 46.32. + x Static buckling and instability - 87.19.St Movement and locomotion - 85.40.Ls Metallization, contacts, interconnects; device isolationJ.-C. Géminard: Permanent address: Laboratoire de Physique, Ecole Normale Supérieure de Lyon, 64, Allée dItalie, 69364 Lyon cedex 07, France     

Wrinkling of vesicles during transient dynamics in elongational flow

Recent experiments by Kantsler et al. [Phys. Rev. Lett. 99, 178102 (2007)10.1103/PhysRevLett.99.178102] have shown that the relaxational dynamics of a vesicle in external elongation flow is accompanied by the formation of wrinkles on a membrane. Motivated by these experiments we present a theory describing the dynamics of a wrinkled membrane. The formation of wrinkles is related to the dynamical instability induced by negative surface tension of the membrane. For quasispherical vesicles we perform analytical study of the wrinkle structure dynamics. We derive the expression for the instability threshold and identify three stages of the dynamics. The scaling laws for the temporal evolution of wrinkling wavelength and surface tension are established, confirmed numerically, and compared to experimental results.     

Effect of the configuration of a wrinklon on the distributions of the energy and elastic strain in a graphene nanoribbon

The formation of wrinkles in thin membranes is a widespread phenomenon. In particular, wrinkles can appear in graphene, which is the thinnest natural membrane, and affect its properties. A region where wrinkles with different wavelengths are linked is called wrinklon. Conditions of the fixing of an elastically deformed graphene sheet dictate a certain wavelength of wrinkles near the fixed edge. Wrinkles with a longer wavelength become more energetically favorable with an increase in the distance from the edge. As a result, wrinklons appear and reduce the potential energy of the system by uniting wrinkles into larger wrinkles with an increase in the distance from the edge. The possibility of implementing various equilibrium configurations of wrinklons at given plane strains in graphene has been demonstrated by the molecular quasistatic method. The distributions of the energy and elastic strain components in wrinklons with various configurations for nanoribbons with different widths have been calculated.     

Fluctuation-induced forces between inclusions in a fluid membrane under tension

We develop an exact method to calculate thermal Casimir forces between inclusions of arbitrary shapes and separation, embedded in a fluid membrane whose fluctuations are governed by the combined action of surface tension, bending modulus, and Gaussian rigidity. Each object's shape and mechanical properties enter only through a characteristic matrix, a static analog of the scattering matrix. We calculate the Casimir interaction between two elastic disks embedded in a membrane. In particular, we find that at short separations the interaction is strong and independent of surface tension.     

Crumpling of a stiff tethered membrane

A first-principles numerical model for crumpling of a stiff tethered membrane is introduced. This model displays wrinkles, ridge formation, ridge collapse, and initiation of stiffness divergence. The amplitude and wavelength of the wrinkles and the scaling exponent of the stiffness divergence are consistent with both theory and experiment. Close to the stiffness divergence further buckling is hindered by the nonzero thickness of the membrane, and its elastic behavior becomes similar to that of dry granular media. No change in the distribution of contact forces can be observed at the crossover, implying that the network of ridges is then simultaneously a granular force-chain network.     

Elastic energy of tilt and bending of fluid membranes

Tilt of hydrocarbon chains of lipid molecules with respect to membrane plane is commonly considered to characterize the internal structure of a membrane in the crystalline state. However, membranes in the liquid state can also exhibit tilt resulting from packing constraints imposed on the lipid molecules in diverse biologically relevant structures such as intermediates of membrane fusion, pores in lipid bilayers and others. We analyze the energetics of tilt in liquid membranes and its coupling with membrane bending. We consider three contributions to the elastic energy: constant tilt, variation of tilt along the membrane surface and membrane bending. The major assumption of the model is that the core of a liquid membrane has the common properties of an elastic continuum. We show that the variation of tilt and membrane bending are additive and that their energy contributions are determined by the same elastic coefficient: the Helfrich bending modulus, the modulus of Gaussian curvature and the spontaneous curvature known from previous studies of pure bending. The energy of a combined deformation of bending and varying tilt is determined by an effective tensor accounting for the two factors. In contrast, the deformation of constant tilt does not couple with bending and its contribution to the elastic energy is determined by an independent elastic constant. While accurate determination of this constant requires additional measurements, we estimate its value using a simplified approach. We discuss the relationships between the obtained elastic Hamiltonian of a membrane and the previous models of membrane elasticity. Received 10 February 2000 and Received in final form 19 June 2000     

Vesicle dynamics in time-dependent elongation flow: wrinkling instability

We present experimental results on the relaxation dynamics of vesicles subjected to a time-dependent elongation flow. We observed and characterized a new instability, which results in the formation of higher-order modes of the vesicle shape (wrinkles), after a switch in the direction of the velocity gradient. This surprising generation of membrane wrinkles can be explained by the appearance of a negative surface tension during the vesicle deflation, which tunes itself to alternating stress. Moreover, the formation of buds in the vesicle membrane was observed in the vicinity of the dynamical transition point.     

Wrinkling of pressurized elastic shells

We study the formation of localized structures formed by the point loading of an internally pressurized elastic shell. While unpressurized shells (such as a ping-pong ball) buckle into polygonal structures, we show that pressurized shells are subject to a wrinkling instability. We study wrinkling in depth, presenting scaling laws for the critical indentation at which wrinkling occurs and the number of wrinkles formed in terms of the internal pressurization and material properties of the shell. These results are validated by numerical simulations. We show that the evolution of the wrinkle length with increasing indentation can be understood for highly pressurized shells from membrane theory. These results suggest that the position and number of wrinkles may be used in combination to give simple methods for the estimation of the mechanical properties of highly pressurized shells.     

气泡与弹性膜的耦合效应数值模拟

本文在前人研究的基础上,计入浮力、表面张力、不同流体密度比等因素对弹性膜附近气泡运动的影响,结合不可压缩理想流体理论,建立气泡与弹性膜耦合动力学数值模型,采用边界元方法进行求解,计算值与Turangan等的实验结果符合良好.通过对弹性膜附近气泡运动的数值模拟,详细分析了弹性膜两侧为同种密度液体以及不同密度液体时气泡的运动,随后又分析气泡在弹性膜和浮力的共同作用下气泡的射流特性.旨在为相关气泡与弹性膜相互作用特性的研究提供参考. 关键词： 弹性膜 边界元法 气泡 浮力     

Morphological phase diagram for lipid membrane domains with entropic tension

Circular domains in phase-separated lipid vesicles with symmetric leaflet composition commonly exhibit three stable morphologies: flat, dimpled, and budded. However, stable dimples (i.e., partially budded domains) present a puzzle since simple elastic theories of domain shape predict that only flat and spherical budded domains are mechanically stable in the absence of spontaneous curvature. We argue that this inconsistency arises from the failure of the constant surface tension ensemble to properly account for the effect of entropic bending fluctuations. Formulating membrane elasticity within an entropic tension ensemble, wherein tension represents the free energy cost of extracting membrane area from thermal bending of the membrane, we calculate a morphological phase diagram that contains regions of mechanical stability for each of the flat, dimpled, and budded domain morphologies.     

Gauge fields,ripples and wrinkles in graphene layers

We analyze elastic deformations of graphene sheets which lead to effective gauge fields acting on the charge carriers. Corrugations in the substrate induce stresses which, in turn, can give rise to mechanical instabilities and the formation of wrinkles. Similar effects may take place in suspended graphene samples under tension.     

The sound of a suddenly tensioned membrane

The sound produced by suddenly tugging one end of an elastic sheet is investigated. The elastic equations of motion are solved within the membrane in the limit where fluid loading may be neglected. It is found that if the membrane is paper a tension wave travels supersonically through the sheet. There is no motion ahead of this wave but behind it the tensioned sheet supports a transverse vibration. We find that a membrane excited in this way is silent except at the tugged end and at the tension front. The far field density perturbation has the characteristic features of a two-dimensional sound field produced by a stationary line source at the tugged end and a supersonically moving line source at the tension front. When the tension is impulsively applied there is a sonic boom that travels in an unattenuated beam on the Mach wedge, the relevant Mach number being the ratio of the speed of the tension wave to the speed of sound in the surrounding fluid, but the sound field is always of order $\text{r}{}^{\mathrm{<mtext>?1</mtext><mtext>2</mtext>}}$, where r is the distance of the observer from the source, when the tension is applied over a small but non-zero interval. Fluid loading has a dampening effect on the sheet which is not easy to handle analytically but has an obvious physical interpretation. This model problem is thought to bear on the question of how much noise is made by the vibration of the paper web in a rotary printing machine, where the web tension is often changed abruptly by irregularities in the reel surfaces. The parameters that control the noise output are identified, and the dependence of the sound field on these variables is determined.     

Fluctuation spectrum of fluid membranes coupled to an elastic meshwork: jump of the effective surface tension at the mesh size

We identify a class of composite membranes: fluid bilayers coupled to an elastic meshwork that are such that the meshwork's energy is a function F(el)[A(xi)] not of the real microscopic membrane area A, but of a smoothed membrane's area A(xi), which corresponds to the area of the membrane coarse grained at the mesh size xi. We show that the meshwork modifies the membrane tension sigma both below and above the scale xi, inducing a steep crossover of amplitude deltasigma=dF(el)/dA(xi). The predictions of our model account for the fluctuation spectrum of red blood cell membranes coupled to their cytoskeleton. Our results indicate that the cytoskeleton might be under extensional stress, which would provide a means to regulate available membrane areas. We also predict an observable tension jump for membranes decorated with polymer "brushes."     

Surface tension and the cosmological constant

One of the few predictions from quantum gravity models is Sorkin's observation that the cosmological constant has quantum fluctuations originating in the fundamental discreteness of spacetime at the Planck scale. Here we present a compelling analogy between the cosmological constant of the Universe and the surface tension of fluid membranes. The discreteness of spacetime on the Planck scale translates into the discrete molecular structure of a fluid membrane. We propose an analog quantum gravity experiment which realizes Sorkin's idea in the laboratory. We also notice that the analogy sheds light on the cosmological constant problem, suggesting a mechanism for dynamically generating a vanishingly small cosmological constant. We emphasize the generality of Sorkin's idea and suggest that similar effects occur generically in quantum gravity models.     

The Compressible Viscous Surface-Internal Wave Problem: Stability and Vanishing Surface Tension Limit

This paper concerns the dynamics of two layers of compressible, barotropic, viscous fluid lying atop one another. The lower fluid is bounded below by a rigid bottom, and the upper fluid is bounded above by a trivial fluid of constant pressure. This is a free boundary problem: the interfaces between the fluids and above the upper fluid are free to move. The fluids are acted on by gravity in the bulk, and at the free interfaces we consider both the case of surface tension and the case of no surface forces. We establish a sharp nonlinear global-in-time stability criterion and give the explicit decay rates to the equilibrium. When the upper fluid is heavier than the lower fluid along the equilibrium interface, we characterize the set of surface tension values in which the equilibrium is nonlinearly stable. Remarkably, this set is non-empty, i.e., sufficiently large surface tension can prevent the onset of the Rayleigh-Taylor instability. When the lower fluid is heavier than the upper fluid, we show that the equilibrium is stable for all non-negative surface tensions and we establish the zero surface tension limit.     

Curvature from spin

We show that, considering the dislocation defect induced by torsion in spacetime, which behaves like a string with tension, we are lead also to defect angle and then to curvature of spacetime. The space with torsion and curvature is then equivalent to an elastic continuum which has undergone plastic deformations and, following Sakharov idea of the spacetime as a elastic continuum, we are lead to a gravitational constant, which occurs in the Einstein action, as the metrical elasticity of spacetime with the exact value without introducing any arbitrary cutoff, when also torsion is considered.     

Nematic films and radially anisotropic Delaunay surfaces

We develop a theory of axisymmetric surfaces minimizing a combination of surface tension and nematic elastic energies which may be suitable for describing simple film and bubble shapes. As a function of the elastic constant and the applied tension on the bubbles, we find the analogues of the unduloid, sphere, and nodoid in addition to other new surfaces.     

Numerical simulations of two-dimensional foam by the immersed boundary method

In this paper, we present an immersed boundary (IB) method to simulate a dry foam, i.e., a foam in which most of the volume is attributed to its gas phase. Dry foam dynamics involves the interaction between a gas and a collection of thin liquid-film internal boundaries that partition the gas into discrete cells or bubbles. The liquid-film boundaries are flexible, contract under the influence of surface tension, and are permeable to the gas, which moves across them by diffusion at a rate proportional to the local pressure difference across the boundary. Such problems are conventionally studied by assuming that the pressure is uniform within each bubble. Here, we introduce instead an IB method that takes into account the non-equilibrium fluid mechanics of the gas. To model gas diffusion across the internal liquid-film boundaries, we allow normal slip between the boundary and the gas at a velocity proportional to the (normal) force generated by the boundary surface tension. We implement this method in the two-dimensional case, and test it by verifying the von Neumann relation, which governs the coarsening of a two-dimensional dry foam. The method is further validated by a convergence study, which confirms its first-order accuracy.     

A molecular model for the line tension of lipid membranes

The line tension of a symmetric, lipid bilayer in its liquid-crystalline state is calculated on the basis of a molecular lipid model. The lipid model extends the opposing forces model by an expression for the conformational free energy of the hydrocarbon chains. We consider a membrane edge that consists of a perturbed bilayer covered by a section of a cylinder-like micelle. The structural rearrangement of the lipids implies an excess free energy which we minimize with respect to the cross-sectional shape of the membrane edge, including both the micellar and the bilayer region. The line tension is derived as a function of molecular lipid properties, like the lipid chain length or the head group interaction strength. We also relate it to the spontaneous curvature of the lipid layer. We find the line tension to become smaller for lipid layers that tend to curve more towards the hydrophobic core. Our predictions for the line tension and their relation to experimentally derived values are discussed. Received 2 January 2000