#softmatter — Public Fediverse posts

Heat behaves differently inside living cells than in simple fluid-filled systems.

The study suggests that cellular organization and biomolecules can reshape heat transport, challenging conventional fluid-dynamics predictions.

🔗 https://phys.org/news/2026-05-cells-ways-standard-fluid-physics.html

#HeatTransfer #Biophysics #SoftMatter #CellBiology #Physics

Experimental Physicist
New Dawn Bio

Join New Dawn Bio as an #Experimental Physicist to help us build something the world has never seen before: premium wood grown without cutting trees.

See the full job description on jobRxiv: https://jobrxiv.org/job/new-dawn-bio-27778-experimental-physicist/

#biologicalphysics #biophysics #experimentalphysics #softmatter #ScienceJobs #hiring #research
https://jobrxiv.org/job/new-dawn-bio-27778-experimental-physicist/?fsp_sid=13020

Reaction-controlled ripening can invert intuition: on patterned surfaces, bubble growth is not always “big wins, small loses”.

Geometry and contact angle reshape the chemical potential landscape, enabling reversed volume exchange between bubbles.

🔗 https://doi.org/10.1103/pynn-xgv9

#FluidDynamics #MultiphaseFlow #SoftMatter #Interfaces #physics

A long-theorized material has become reality: DNA-based Olympic gels. Their structure is stabilized not by chemical crosslinks, but by mechanically interlocked molecular rings. A striking example of how geometry and topology shape material behavior.

🔗 https://phys.org/news/2026-04-olympic-gels-theorized-class-dna.html

#SoftMatter #Topology #DNA #Polymers #Physics

Today, five years ago at 11:15 sharp, I successfully defended my PhD thesis. I’m not usually one to celebrate an anniversary. But because this one has taken me by surprise—by how much time has flown—I thought it’d be nice to mark the occassion. I've made a mostly visual summary of my thesis to celebrate:

https://kedara.eu/colloidal-systems/

#Colloids #SoftMatter #Physics #PhD #BrownianMotion #BlogPost

Why can some fluids harden under impact?

Researchers tracked millimeter-sized cornstarch droplets hitting a surface and uncovered three distinct impact regimes, including a surprising liquid-to-solid transition during spreading.

🔗 https://phys.org/news/2026-04-droplet-impacts-reveal-physics-thickening.html

#Physics #FluidMechanics #SoftMatter #Rheology #ImpactDynamics

A cornstarch-water droplet can behave like a liquid and a solid at the same time, depending on how it is stressed.

High-speed imaging reveals how these “oobleck” drops reshape on impact, highlighting the surprising physics of shear-thickening fluids.

🔗 https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-026-01109-3

#FluidDynamics #SoftMatter #Rheology #ComplexFluids #physics

What looks like a simple bubble can become a delivery system. New materials store therapeutic gases and release them through controlled interfacial dynamics.

🔗 https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.aef9968

#Fluids #Interfaces #SoftMatter #DrugDelivery #Physics

UvA physicists 3D-printed #SoftMatter in zero gravity aboard MAPHEUS-16. COLORS experiment revealed how internal stresses form in droplets—key for stronger 3D-printed materials and #bioprinting, both in space and on Earth.

https://phys.org/news/2026-02-rocket-science-3d-soft-gravity.html

#3DPrinting #Microgravity #FluidDynamics

Get to know Stefan Guldin, our newly appointed Professor of Complex #SoftMatter and Scientific Co-Director of the Proteins4Singapore project, in the latest NewIn episode. His research is located at the point where #materialsscience and #lifesciences meet: https://go.tum.de/200698

📷A. Heddergott

▶ https://youtu.be/u0EEvasWNl8

🎥 ProLehre

Rolling Down Soft Surfaces

Place a rigid ball on a hard vertical surface, and it will free fall. Stick a liquid drop there, and it will slide down. But researchers discovered that with a soft sphere and a soft surface, it’s possible to roll down a vertical wall. The effect requires just the right level of squishiness for both the wall and sphere, but when conditions are right, the 1-millimeter radius sphere rolls (with a little slipping) down the wall.

Rolling requires torque, something that’s usually lacking on a vertical surface. But the team found that their soft spheres got the torque needed to roll from their asymmetric contact with the surface. More of the sphere contacted above its centerline than below it. The researchers compared the way the sphere contacted the surface to a crack opening (at the back of the sphere) and a crack closing (at the front of the sphere). That asymmetry creates just enough torque to roll the sphere slowly. The team hopes their discovery opens up new possibilities for soft robots to climb and descend vertical surfaces. (Image and research credit: S. Mitra et al.; via Gizmodo)

#adhesion #fluidDynamics #physics #science #slip #softMatter #solidMechanics

Is ranch dressing a liquid or a solid? our @ScienceDesk asked, via @TheConversationUS's Curious Kids series (also good for curious adults). Turns out it’s something called soft matter, like cookie dough, toothpaste, and snot.

https://theconversation.com/is-ranch-dressing-a-liquid-or-a-solid-a-physicist-explains-249435

#Science #Physics #SoftMatter #FoodScience #Newstodon #NewstodonFriday #FollowFriday

Ultra-Soft Solids Flow By Turning Inside Out

Can a solid flow? What would that even look like? Researchers explored these questions with an ultra-soft gel (think 100,000 times softer than a gummy bear) pumped through a ring-shaped annular pipe. Despite its elasticity — that tendency to return to an original shape that distinguishes solids from fluids — the gel does flow. But after a short distance, furrows form and grow along the gel’s leading edge.

Since the gel alongside the pipe’s walls can’t slide due to friction, the gel flows by essentially turning itself inside out. Inner portions of the gel flow forward and then split off toward one of the walls as they reach the leading edge. This eversion builds up lots of internal stress in the gel, and furrowing — much like crumpling a sheet of paper — relieves that stress. (Image and research credit: J. Hwang et al.; via APS News)

#flowVisualization #fluidDynamics #instability #physics #pipeFlow #science #softMatter #solidMechanics #stress

#GutenbergResearchAward 2025 for materials scientist Anna Balazs from the University of Pittsburgh / World-renowned pioneer in materials theory and soft matter science is honored with #MainzUniversity's most prestigious research award for her exceptional research contributions to the field of so-called smart materials 👉 https://press.uni-mainz.de/anna-balazs-wins-the-2025-gutenberg-research-award/ @dfg_public

#MaterialsScience #SoftMatter #SmartMaterials #CoM2Life

#GutenbergResearchAward 2025 für Materialwissenschaftlerin Anna Balazs / Weltweit renommierte Wegbereiterin in der Materialtheorie und der Wissenschaft der weichen Materie erhält bedeutendsten Forschungspreis der #UniMainz in Anerkennung ihrer herausragenden Beiträge zum Forschungsfeld der sogenannten intelligenten Materialien 👉 https://presse.uni-mainz.de/anna-balazs-erhaelt-gutenberg-research-award-2025/ @dfg_public

#Materialwissenschaften #WeicheMaterie #SoftMatter #IntelligenteMaterialien #Materialwissenschaft #CoM2Life

Cooking Perfect Cacio e Pepe

In cooking, sometimes the simplest recipes are the toughest to master. Cacio e pepe — a classic three-ingredient Italian pasta — is an excellent example. Made properly, the sauce of cheese and black pepper combines with starchy water to coat the pasta in a uniform, cheesy sauce. Or, if you’re me, you wind up with a pasta sauce flecked with stringy clumps of melted cheese. Fortunately for those of us who have yet to master this one, a new research paper has us covered with tips to make the perfect cacio e pepe.

The key to that elusive silky sauce, they found, is the starch – water – cheese combination. Your water needs just the right amount of starch — they found that between 1 – 4% starch by (cheese) mass worked. If the starch concentration is too low (which can easily happen in pasta water), you’ll get the clumpy cheese mess that so frequently happens in my kitchen. Temperature is also critical; if the water is too hot when it’s added, then it can destabilize the sauce. Check out the pre-print’s Section V for the scientific, supposedly foolproof, recipe. I know I’ll be trying it! (Image credit: O. Kadaksoo; research credit: G. Bartolucci et al. pre-print; via APS News)

#cooking #emulsion #fluidDynamics #phaseSeparation #physics #rheology #science #softMatter

ILL #SoftMatter Summer School, 1–3 July 2025 at the Institut Laue-Langevin, #Grenoble

The aim of the school is to provide an overview of the forces governing the behavior of soft matter systems and introduce the most relevant techniques to probe such interactions.

Confirmed speakers include Benoit Coasne, Milena Corredig, Wiebke Drenckhan, Samantha Micciulla, Julian Oberdisse, Sylvain Prevost, Emanuel Schneck, and Alicia Vallet.

https://workshops.ill.fr/event/503/

2nd funding period for #ResearchTrainingGroup 2516 "Control of structure formation in #SoftMatter at and through interfaces" of @uni_mainz_eng, @mpi_polymer, @TUDarmstadt & @Uni_Stuttgart / @dfg_public provides funding of € 5.2 mio. / #physics #chemistry
https://nachrichten.idw-online.de/2024/11/21/second-funding-period-for-research-training-group-2516-on-structure-formation-in-soft-matter

Our #preprint where we derive an #activeGel #model with entropic elasticity of the #microstructure from the thermodynamic constraints on the dynamics of #myosin molecular motors is now updated!

Hopefully more readable, and with the example of a #cyst like contractile sphere.

#cytoskeleton #rheology #activeMatter #softMatter #actomyosin

The expansion of turbid drops in water: Researchers at @uni_mainz_eng and @HHU_de managed to look inside cloudy liquids for the first time // #physics #SoftMatter @RoySocChem
https://nachrichten.idw-online.de/2024/10/17/the-expansion-of-turbid-drops-in-water

@mechanobio

A new #preprint where we derive an #activeGel #model with entropic elasticity of the #microstructure and give interpretations of the thermodynamic constraints on the dynamics of #myosin molecular motors.

#cytoskeleton #rheology #activeMatter #softMatter

This planet-like balloon started out as two elastomer sheets, heat-sealed together into a spiraling tube. As the balloon was inflated, it changed from flat to a saddle-like shape. With more air, the pressure inside increased, triggering an instability that caused the middle of the balloon to bulge. As inflation continued, the central bulge expanded, unbonding layer after layer of the seal. Even late in inflation, the balloon maintains hints of its original shape in the form of a ring around the Jovian bulge in the middle. (Image credit: N. Vani et al.)

https://fyfluiddynamics.com/2024/05/bulging-balloons/

#2024gosmp #balloons #elasticity #fluidDynamics #instability #physics #science #softMatter

Nice view from the Forum building in #Groningen during the #softmatter symposium. Weather cleared up fortunately. ⛅️

Shared with me by a polymer chemistry colleague at Berkeley. Published, appropriately, in the journal Soft Matter
https://pubs.rsc.org/en/content/articlelanding/2017/sm/c6sm02795d
#chemistry #chemiverse #softmatter #CiteThatShit

We got finally published our article on granular cubic particles. Thanks to our collaborators in BUAP, Puebla and Universidad Autónoma de Hidalgo.
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S037843712300866X
#GranularMatter #Physics #StatisticalPhysics #SoftMatter

The annual workshop of the GDR "Interfacial #SoftMatter" will take place
in #Rennes next week
#CNRS

detailed program here:
https://ism2023.sciencesconf.org/program/details

For those not registered to attend the #workshop physically, they will also broadcast the event online if you wish to attend remotely.

Feel free to join us and connect to the following #BigBlueButton link in
your favourite web browser:

https://meet.univ-grenoble-alpes.fr/b/lio-wrh-fym-c3w

Check out the winners of this year’s Gallery of Soft Matter Physics - Enlarge / Brown University scientists used two 3D-printed plastic disks... - https://arstechnica.com/?p=1923819 #galleryofsoftmatterphysics #materialsscience #apsmarchmeeting #gaming&culture #softmatter #science #physics

Watch the lectures of Sara Bonella, Ignacio Pagonabarraga and Georg Kaser now, if you missed them 👀
https://youtube.com/@ESIVienna/videos

#GlobalWarming #GlacierMelt #GreenhouseGas #GasEmissions #ClimateChange
#StatMech #statisticalmechanics #SoftMatter #softmatterphysics
@univienna @uniinnsbruck