No Arabic abstract
The friction of a stationary moving skate on smooth ice is investigated, in particular in relation to the formation of a thin layer of water between skate and ice. It is found that the combination of ploughing and sliding gives a friction force that is rather insensitive for parameters such as velocity and temperature. The weak dependence originates from the pressure adjustment inside the water layer. For instance, high velocities, which would give rise to high friction, also lead to large pressures, which, in turn, decrease the contact zone and so lower the friction. The theory is a combination and completion of two existing but conflicting theories on the formation of the water layer.
With the advent of the technology of the oleoplaned slippery surfaces as the better solution to self-cleaning, anti fouling and self-healing smart surfaces, the stability of the oil layer on the surfaces has caught a great deal of attention from the research community. Rose petals irrespective of its superhydrophobic nature exhibits a very high adhesion owing to the hierarchical structures and can thus serve as an excellent surface to obtain a stable oil film. Also, with gradual covering of the rose petal structures by the oil the change in the adhesion force is observed to decrease and an increase in the film thickness beyond a certain height causes cloaking of the droplet and thus presents us with an optimum thickness which can give us a stable oil film and also exhibit high degree of slipperiness. The findings can be applied for further applications in droplet based microfluidics, as a low energy actuation surface, or as a self-healing and self-cleaning surface.
The rheological properties of cells and tissues are central to embryonic development and homoeostasis in adult tissues and organs and are closely related to their physiological activities. In this work, we present our study of rheological experiments on cell monolayer under serum starvation compared to that of healthy cell monolayer with full serum. The normal functioning of cells depends on the micronutrient supply provided by the serum in the growth media. Serum starvation is one of the most widely used procedures in cell biology. Serum deficiency may lead to genomic instability, variation in protein expression, chronic diseases, and some specific types of cancers. However, the effect of deprivation of serum concentration on the material properties of cells is still unknown. Therefore, we performed the macro-rheology experiments to investigate the effect of serum starvation on a fully confluent Madin Darby Canine Kidney (MDCK) cell monolayer. The material properties such as storage modulus (G) and loss modulus (G), of the monolayer, were measured using oscillatory shear experiments under serum-free (0% FBS) and full serum (10% FBS) conditions. Additionally, the step strain experiments were performed to gain more insights into the viscoelastic properties of the cell monolayer. Our results indicate that without serum, the loss and storage moduli decrease and do not recover fully even after small deformation. This is because of the lack of nutrients, which may result in many permanent physiological changes. Whereas, the healthy cell monolayer under full serum condition, remains strong & flexible, and can fully recover even from a large deformation at higher strain.
We develop and implement a novel lattice Boltzmann scheme to study multicomponent flows on curved surfaces, coupling the continuity and Navier-Stokes equations with the Cahn-Hilliard equation to track the evolution of the binary fluid interfaces. Standard lattice Boltzmann method relies on regular Cartesian grids, which makes it generally unsuitable to study flow problems on curved surfaces. To alleviate this limitation, we use a vielbein formalism to write down the Boltzmann equation on an arbitrary geometry, and solve the evolution of the fluid distribution functions using a finite difference method. Focussing on the torus geometry as an example of a curved surface, we demonstrate drift motions of fluid droplets and stripes embedded on the surface of a torus. Interestingly, they migrate in opposite directions: fluid droplets to the outer side while fluid stripes to the inner side of the torus. For the latter we demonstrate that the global minimum configuration is unique for small stripe widths, but it becomes bistable for large stripe widths. Our simulations are also in agreement with analytical predictions for the Laplace pressure of the fluid stripes, and their damped oscillatory motion as they approach equilibrium configurations, capturing the corresponding decay timescale and oscillation frequency. Finally, we simulate the coarsening dynamics of phase separating binary fluids in the hydrodynamics and diffusive regimes for tori of various shapes, and compare the results against those for a flat two-dimensional surface. Our lattice Boltzmann scheme can be extended to other surfaces and coupled to other dynamical equations, opening up a vast range of applications involving complex flows on curved geometries.
Compared to agile legged animals, wheeled and tracked vehicles often suffer large performance loss on granular surfaces like sand and gravel. Understanding the mechanics of legged locomotion on granular media can aid the development of legged robots with improved mobility on granular surfaces; however, no general force model yet exists for granular media to predict ground reaction forces during complex limb intrusions. Inspired by a recent study of sand-swimming, we develop a resistive force model in the vertical plane for legged locomotion on granular media. We divide an intruder of complex morphology and kinematics, e.g., a bio-inspired robot L-leg rotated through uniform granular media (loosely packed ~ 1 mm diameter poppy seeds), into small segments, and measure stresses as a function of depth, orientation, and direction of motion using a model leg segment. Summation of segmental forces over the intruder predicts the net forces on both an L-leg and a reversed L-leg rotated through granular media with better accuracy than using simple one-dimensional penetration and drag force models. A multi-body dynamic simulation using the resistive force model predicts the speeds of a small legged robot (15 cm, 150 g) moving on granular media using both L-legs and reversed L-legs.
We have studied the interaction of metastable $^4$He$_2^*$ excimer molecules with quantized vortices in superfluid $^4$He in the zero temperature limit. The vortices were generated by either rotation or ion injection. The trapping diameter of the molecules on quantized vortices was found to be $96pm6$,nm at a pressure of 0.1,bar and $27pm5$,nm at 5.0 bar. We have also demonstrated that a moving tangle of vortices can carry the molecules through the superfluid helium.