arXiv subjects

Ali Naji

Publications and source records attributed to Ali Naji.

At least 37 records · Page 2Linked to original sources

arXiv2018

Role of metallic core for the stability of virus-like particles in strongly coupled electrostatics

We investigate the osmotic (electrostatic) pressure acting on the proteinaceous shell of a generic model of virus-like particles (VLPs), comprising a charged outer shell and a metallic nanoparticle core, coated by a charged layer and bathed in an aqueous electrolyte (salt) solution. Motivated by the recent studies accentuating the role of multivalent ions for the stability of VLPs, we focus on the effects of multivalent cations and anions in an otherwise monovalent ionic bathing solution. We perform extensive Monte-Carlo simulations based on appropriate Coulombic interactions that consistently take into account the effects of salt screening, the dielectric polarization of the metallic core, and the strong-coupling electrostatics due to the presence of multivalent ions. We specifically study the intricate roles these factors play in the electrostatic stability of the model VLPs. It is shown that while the insertion of a metallic nanoparticle by itself can produce negative, inward-directed, pressure on the outer shell, addition of only a small amount of multivalent counterions can robustly engender negative pressures, enhancing the VLP stability across a wide range of values for the system parameters.

cond-mat.soft↗

arXiv2018

Hydrodynamic stress correlations in fluid films driven by stochastic surface forcing

We study hydrodynamic fluctuations in a compressible and viscous fluid film confined between two rigid, no-slip, parallel plates, where one of the plates is kept fixed, while the other one is driven in small-amplitude, translational, displacements around its reference position. This jiggling motion is assumed to be driven by a stochastic, external, surface forcing of zero mean and finite variance. Thus, while the transverse (shear) and longitudinal (compressional) hydrodynamic stresses produced in the film vanish on average on either of the plates, these stresses exhibit fluctuations that can be quantified through their equal-time, two-point, correlation functions. For transverse stresses, we show that the correlation functions of the stresses acting on the same plate (self-correlators) as well as the correlation function of the stresses acting on different plates (cross-correlators) exhibit universal, decaying, power-law behaviors as functions of the inter-plate separation. At small separations, the exponents are given by -1, while at large separations, the exponents are found as -2 (self-correlator on the fixed plate), -4 (excess self-correlator on the mobile plate) and -3 (cross-correlator). For longitudinal stresses, we find much weaker power-law decays in the large separation regime, with exponents -3/2 (excess self-correlator on the mobile plate) and -1 (cross-correlator). The self-correlator on the fixed plate increases and levels off upon increasing the inter-plate separation, reflecting the non-decaying nature of the longitudinal forces acting on the fixed plate.

cond-mat.soft↗

arXiv2018

Re-entrant bimodality in spheroidal chiral swimmers in shear flow

We use a continuum model to report on the behavior of a dilute suspension of chiral swimmers subject to externally imposed shear in a planar channel. Swimmer orientation in response to the imposed shear can be characterized by two distinct phases of behavior, corresponding to unimodal or bimodal distribution functions for swimmer orientation along the channel. These phases indicate the occurrence (or not) of a population splitting phenomenon changing the swimming direction of a macroscopic fraction of active particles to the exact opposite of that dictated by the imposed flow. We present a detailed quantitative analysis elucidating the complexities added to the population splitting behavior of swimmers when they are chiral. In particular, the transition from unimodal to bimodal and vice versa are shown to display a re-entrant behavior across the parameter space spanned by varying the chiral angular speed. We also present the notable effects of particle aspect ratio and self-propulsion speed on system phase behavior and discuss potential implications of our results in applications such as swimmer separation/sorting.

cond-mat.soft↗

arXiv2018

Active fluids at circular boundaries: Swim pressure and anomalous droplet ripening

We investigate the swim pressure exerted by non-chiral and chiral active particles on convex or concave circular boundaries. Active particles are modeled as non-interacting and non-aligning self-propelled Brownian particles. The convex and concave circular boundaries are used as models representing a fixed inclusion immersed in an active bath and a cavity (or container) enclosing the active particles, respectively. We first present a detailed analysis of the role of convex versus concave boundary curvature and of the chirality of active particles on their spatial distribution, chirality-induced currents, and the swim pressure they exert on the bounding surfaces. The results will then be used to predict the mechanical equilibria of suspended fluid enclosures (generically referred to as 'droplets') in a bulk with active particles being present either inside the bulk fluid or within the suspended droplets. We show that, while droplets containing active particles and suspended in a normal bulk behave in accordance with standard capillary paradigms, those containing a normal fluid exhibit anomalous behaviors when suspended in an active bulk. In the latter case, the excess swim pressure results in non-monotonic dependence of the inside droplet pressure on the droplet radius. As a result, we find a regime of anomalous capillarity for a single droplet, where the inside droplet pressure increases upon increasing the droplet size. In the case of two interconnected droplets, we show that mechanical equilibrium can occur also when they have different sizes. We further identify a regime of anomalous ripening, where two unequal-sized droplets can reach a final state of equal sizes upon interconnection, in stark contrast with the standard Ostwald ripening phenomenon, implying shrinkage of the smaller droplet in favor of the larger one.

cond-mat.soft↗

arXiv2017

Effective interactions between inclusions in an active bath

We study effective two- and three-body interactions between non-active colloidal inclusions in an active bath of chiral or non-chiral particles, using Brownian Dynamics simulations within a standard, two-dimensional model of disk-shaped inclusions and active particles. In a non-chiral active bath, we first corroborate previous findings on effective two-body repulsion mediated between the inclusions by elucidating the detailed non-monotonic features of the two-body force profiles, including a primary maximum, and a secondary hump at larger separations that was not previously reported. We then show that these features arise directly from the formation, and sequential overlaps, of circular layers (or 'rings') of active particles around the inclusions, as the latter are brought to small surface separations. These rings extend to radial distances of a few active-particle radii from the surface of inclusions, giving the hard-core inclusions relatively thick, soft, repulsive 'shoulders', whose multiple overlaps then enable significant (non-pairwise) three-body forces in both non-chiral and chiral active baths. The resulting three-body forces can even exceed the two-body forces in magnitude and display distinct repulsive and attractive regimes at intermediate to large self-propulsion strengths. In a chiral active bath, we show that, while active particles still tend to accumulate at the immediate vicinity of the inclusions, they exhibit strong depletion from the intervening region between the inclusions, and partial depletion from relatively thick, circular, zones further away from the inclusions. In this case, the effective, predominantly repulsive, interactions between the inclusions turn to active, chirality-induced, depletion-type attractions, acting over an extended range of separations.

cond-mat.soft↗

arXiv2017

Population splitting of rodlike swimmers in Couette flow

We present a quantitative analysis on the response of a dilute active suspension of self-propelled rods (swimmers) in a planar channel subjected to an imposed shear flow. To best capture the salient features of shear-induced effects, we consider the case of an imposed Couette flow, providing a constant shear rate across the channel. We argue that the steady-state behavior of swimmers can be understood in the light of a population splitting phenomenon, occurring as the shear rate exceeds a certain threshold, initiating the reversal of swimming direction for a finite fraction of swimmers from down- to upstream or vice versa, depending on swimmer position within the channel. Swimmers thus split into two distinct, statistically significant and oppositely swimming majority and minority populations. The onset of population splitting translates into a transition from a self-propulsion-dominated regime to a shear-dominated regime, corresponding to a unimodal-to-bimodal change in the probability distribution function of the swimmer orientation. We present a phase diagram in terms of the swim and flow Peclet numbers showing the separation of these two regimes by a discontinuous transition line. Our results shed further light on the behavior of swimmers in a shear flow and provide an explanation for the previously reported non-monotonic behavior of the mean, near-wall, parallel-to-flow orientation of swimmers with increasing shear strength.

cond-mat.soft↗

arXiv2016

Pseudo-Casimir stresses and elasticity of a confined elastomer film

Investigations of the elastic behavior of bulk elastomers have traditionally proceeded on the basis of classical rubber elasticity, which regards chains as thermally fluctuating but disregards the thermal fluctuations of the cross-links. Here, we consider an incompressible and flat elastomer film of an axisymmetric shape confined between two large hard co-planar substrates, with the axis of the film perpendicular to the substrates. We address the impact that thermal fluctuations of the cross-links have on the free energy of elastic deformation of the system, subject to the requirement that the fluctuating elastomer cannot detach from the substrates. We examine the behavior of the deformation free energy for one case where a rigid pinning boundary condition is applied to a class of elastic fluctuations at the confining surfaces, and another case where the same elastic fluctuations are subjected to soft "gluing" potentials. We find that there can be significant departures (both quantitative and qualitative) from the prediction of classical rubber elasticity theory when elastic fluctuations are included. Finally, we compare the character of the attractive part of the elastic fluctuation-induced, or pseudo-Casimir, stress with the standard thermal Casimir stress in confined but non-elastomeric systems, finding the same power law decay behavior when a rigid pinning boundary condition is applied, for the case of the gluing potential, we find that the leading order correction to the attractive part of the fluctuation stress decays inversely with the inter-substrate separation.

cond-mat.soft↗

arXiv2015

Hydrodynamic fluctuation-induced forces in confined fluids

We study thermal, fluctuation-induced hydrodynamic interaction forces in a classical, compressible, viscous fluid confined between two rigid, planar walls with no-slip boundary conditions. We calculate hydrodynamic fluctuations using the linearized, stochastic Navier-Stokes formalism of Landau and Lifshitz. The mean fluctuation-induced force acting on the fluid boundaries vanishes in this system, so we evaluate the two-point, time-dependent force correlations. The equal-time correlation function of the forces acting on a single wall gives the force variance, which we show to be finite and independent of the plate separation at large inter-plate distances. The equal-time, cross-plate force correlation, on the other hand, decays with the inverse inter-plate distance and is independent of the fluid viscosity at large distances; it turns out to be negative over the whole range of plate separations, indicating that the two bounding plates are subjected to counter-phase correlations. We show that the time-dependent force correlations exhibit damped temporal oscillations for small plate separations and a more irregular oscillatory behavior at large separations. The long-range hydrodynamic correlations reported here represent a "secondary Casimir effect", because the mean fluctuation-induced force, which represents the primary Casimir effect, is absent.

cond-mat.stat-mech↗

arXiv2015

Van der Waals interaction between polymers with sequence-specific polarizabilities: Stiff polymers and flexible Gaussian coils

We consider the van der Waals interaction between a pair of polymers with quenched heterogeneous sequences of local polarizabilities along their backbones, and study the effective pairwise interaction energy for both stiff polymers and flexible Gaussian coils. In particular, we focus on the cases where the pair of polarizability sequences are (i)~distinct and (ii)~identical. We find that the pairwise interaction energies of distinct and identical Gaussian coils are both isotropic and exhibit the same decay behavior for separations larger than the gyration radius, in contradistinction to the orientationally anisotropic interaction energies of distinct and identical stiff polymers. For both Gaussian coils and stiff polymers, the attractive interaction between identical polymers is enhanced if the polarizability sequence is more heterogeneous.

cond-mat.soft↗

arXiv2015

Ion-mediated interactions between net-neutral slabs: Weak and strong disorder effects

We investigate the effective interaction between two randomly charged but otherwise net-neutral, planar dielectric slabs immersed in an asymmetric Coulomb fluid containing a mixture of mobile monovalent and multivalent ions. The presence of charge disorder on the apposed bounding surfaces of the slabs leads to substantial qualitative changes in the way they interact, as compared with the standard picture provided by the van der Waals and image-induced, ion-depletion interactions. While, the latter predict purely attractive interactions between strictly neutral slabs, we show that the combined effects from surface charge disorder, image depletion, Debye (or salt) screening and also, in particular, their coupling with multivalent ions, give rise to a more diverse behavior for the effective interaction between net-neutral slabs. Disorder effects show large variation depending on the properly quantified strength of disorder, leading either to non-monotonic effective interaction with both repulsive and attractive branches when the surface charges are weakly disordered (small disorder variance) or to a dominating attractive interaction that is larger both in its range and magnitude than what is predicted from the van der Waals and image-induced, ion-depletion interactions, when the surfaces are strongly disordered (large disorder variance).

cond-mat.soft↗

arXiv2015

Molecular recognition by van der Waals interaction between polymers with sequence-specific polarizabilities

We analyze van der Waals interactions between two rigid polymers with sequence-specific, anisotropic polarizabilities along the polymer backbones, so that the dipole moments fluctuate parallel to the polymer backbones. Assuming that each polymer has a quenched-in polarizability sequence which reflects, for example, the polynucleotide sequence of a double-stranded DNA molecule, we study the van der Waals interaction energy between a pair of such polymers with rod-like structure for the cases where their respective polarizability sequences are (i) distinct and (ii) identical, with both zero and non-zero correlation length of the polarizability correlator along the polymer backbones in the latter case. For identical polymers, we find a novel $r^{-5}$ scaling behavior of the van der Waals interaction energy for small inter-polymer separation $r$, in contradistinction to the $r^{-4}$ scaling behavior of distinct polymers, with furthermore a pronounced angular dependence favoring attraction between sufficiently aligned identical polymers. Such behavior can assist the molecular recognition between polymers.

cond-mat.soft↗

arXiv2014

Strong coupling electrostatics for randomly charged surfaces: Antifragility and effective interactions

We study the effective interaction mediated by strongly coupled Coulomb fluids between dielectric surfaces carrying quenched, random monopolar charges with equal mean and variance, both when the Coulomb fluid consists only of mobile multivalent counterions and when it consists of an asymmetric ionic mixture containing multivalent and monovalent (salt) ions in equilibrium with an aqueous bulk reservoir. We analyze the consequences that follow from the interplay between surface charge disorder, dielectric and salt image effects, and the strong electrostatic coupling that results from multivalent counterions on the distribution of these ions and the effective interaction pressure they mediate between the surfaces. In a dielectrically homogeneous system, we show that the multivalent counterions are attracted towards the surfaces with a singular, disorder-induced potential that diverges logarithmically on approach to the surfaces, creating a singular counterion density profile with an algebraic divergence at the surfaces. This effect drives the system towards a state of lower thermal "disorder", one that can be described by a renormalized temperature, exhibiting thus a remarkable antifragility. The interaction pressure acting on the surfaces displays in general a highly non-monotonic behavior as a function of the inter-surface separation with a prominent regime of attraction at small to intermediate separations. This attraction is caused directly by the combined effects from charge disorder and strong coupling electrostatics of multivalent counterions, which can be quite significant even with a small degree of surface charge disorder relative to the mean surface charge. The strong coupling, disorder-induced attraction is typically far more stronger than the van der Waals interaction between the surfaces, especially within a range of several nanometers for the inter-surface separation.

cond-mat.soft↗

arXiv2014

Asymmetric Coulomb fluids at randomly charged dielectric interfaces: Anti-fragility, overcharging and charge inversion

We study the distribution of multivalent counterions next to a dielectric slab, bearing a quenched, random distribution of charges on one of its solution interfaces, with a given mean and variance, both in the absence and in the presence of a bathing monovalent salt solution. We use the previously derived approach based on the dressed multivalent-ion theory that combines aspects of the strong and weak coupling of multivalent and monovalent ions in a single framework. The presence of quenched charge disorder on the charged surface of the dielectric slab is shown to substantially increase the density of multivalent counterions in its vicinity. In the counterion-only model (with no monovalent salt ions), the surface disorder generates an additional logarithmic attraction potential and thus an algebraically singular counterion density profile at the surface. This behavior persists also in the presence of a monovalent salt bath and results in significant violation of the contact-value theorem, reflecting the anti-fragility effects of the disorder that drive the system towards a more ordered state. In the presence of an interfacial dielectric discontinuity, depleting the counterion layer at the surface, the charge disorder still generates a much enhanced counterion density further away from the surface. Likewise, the charge inversion and/or overcharging of the surface occur more strongly and at smaller bulk concentrations of multivalent counterions when the surface carries quenched charge disorder. Overall, the presence of quenched surface charge disorder leads to sizable effects in the distribution of multivalent counterions in a wide range of realistic parameters and typically within a distance of a few nanometers from the charged surface.

cond-mat.soft↗

arXiv2014

Fluctuation-induced interactions in nematics with disordered anchoring energy

We examine fluctuation-induced (pseudo-Casimir) interactions in nematic liquid-crystalline films confined between two surfaces, where one of the surfaces imposes a strong homeotropic anchoring (ensuring a uniform mean director profile), while the other one is assumed to be a chemically disordered substrate exhibiting an annealed, random distribution of anchoring energies. We employ a saddle-point approximation to evaluate the free energy of interaction mediated between the two surfaces and investigate how the interaction force is influenced by the presence of disordered surface anchoring energy. It is shown that the disorder results in a renormalization of the effective surface anchoring parameter in a way that it leads to quantitative and qualitative changes (including a change of sign at intermediate inter-surface separations) in the pseudo-Casimir interaction force when compared with the interaction force in the absence of disorder.

cond-mat.soft↗

arXiv2013

Global analysis of the ground-state wrapping conformation of a charged polymer on an oppositely charged nano-sphere

We investigate the wrapping conformations of a strongly adsorbed polymer chain on an oppositely charged nano-sphere by employing a reduced (dimensionless) representation of a primitive chain-sphere model. This enables us to determine the global phase behavior of the chain conformation in a wide range of values for the system parameters including the chain contour length, its linear charge density and persistence length as well as the nano-sphere charge and radius, and also the salt concentration in the bathing solution. The phase behavior of a charged chain-sphere complex can be described in terms of a few distinct conformational symmetry classes (phases) separated by continuous or discontinuous transition lines which are determined by means of appropriately defined (order) parameters. Our results can be applied to a wide class of strongly coupled polymer-sphere complexes including, for instances, complexes that comprise a mechanically flexible or semiflexible polymer chain or an extremely short or long chain and, as a special case, include the previously studied example of DNA-histone complexes.

cond-mat.soft↗

arXiv2013

Pseudo-Casimir interactions across nematic films with disordered anchoring axis

We consider the effective pseudo-Casimir interaction forces mediated by a nematic liquid-crystalline film bounded by two planar surfaces, one of which imposes a random (disordered) distribution of the preferred anchoring axis in the so-called easy direction. We consider both the case of a quenched as well as an annealed disorder for the easy direction on the disordered surface and analyze the resultant fluctuation-induced interaction between the surfaces. In the case of quenched disorder, we show that the disorder effects appear additively in the total interaction and are dominant at intermediate inter-surface separations. Disorder effects are shown to be unimportant at both very small and very large separations. In the case of annealed disorder its effects are non-additive in the total inter-surface interaction and can be rationalized in terms of a renormalized extrapolation length.

cond-mat.soft↗

arXiv2013

Perspective: Coulomb fluids -- weak coupling, strong coupling, in between and beyond

We present a personal view on the current state of statistical mechanics of Coulomb fluids with special emphasis on the interactions between macromolecular surfaces, concentrating on the weak and the strong coupling limits. Both are introduced for a (primitive) counterion-only system in the presence of macroscopic, uniformly charged boundaries, where they can be derived systematically. Later we show how this formalism can be generalized to the cases with additional characteristic length scales that introduce new coupling parameters into the problem. These cases most notably include asymmetric ionic mixtures with mono- and multivalent ions that couple differently to charged surfaces, ions with internal charge (multipolar) structure and finite static polarizability, where weak and strong coupling limits can be constructed by analogy with the counterion-only case and lead to important new insights into their properties that can not be derived by any other means.

cond-mat.soft↗

arXiv2013

Multivalent ion effects on electrostatic stability of virus-like nano-shells

Electrostatic properties and stability of charged virus-like nano-shells are examined in ionic solutions with monovalent and multivalent ions. A theoretical model based on a thin charged spherical shell and multivalent ions within the "dressed multivalent ion" approximation, yielding their distribution across the shell and the corresponding electrostatic (osmotic) pressure acting on the shell, is compared with extensive implicit Monte-Carlo simulations. It is found to be accurate for positive or low negative surface charge densities of the shell and for sufficiently high (low) monovalent (multivalent) salt concentrations. Phase diagrams involving electrostatic pressure exhibit positive and negative values, corresponding to an outward and an inward facing force on the shell, respectively. This provides an explanation for the high sensitivity of viral shell stability and self-assembly of viral capsid shells on the ionic environment.

cond-mat.soft↗