arXiv subjects

Emma Sparr

Publications and source records attributed to Emma Sparr.

3 recordsLinked to original sources

arXiv2026

Technological Excellence Requires Human and Social Context

Breakthrough technologies increasingly shape social institutions, economic systems, and political futures. Yet models of research excellence associated with such technologies often prioritize technical performance, scalability, and short-term innovation metrics while treating ethical, social, and cultural dimensions as secondary considerations. This perspective article argues that such separation is no longer tenable. We propose a broader understanding of excellence that combines technical rigor with ethical robustness, social intelligibility, and long-term relevance. The rapid emergence of generative and agentic artificial intelligence further underscores this argument. As technological systems increasingly operate through language, interpretation, and normative alignment, expertise traditionally cultivated in the humanities and social sciences becomes integral to the design, governance, and responsible deployment of such systems. Drawing on historical examples and contemporary research practices, this article examines five interconnected domains where the humanities and social sciences, treated as integrated dimensions of research practice, can strengthen technological development: (1) ethical, legal, and social integration in agenda-setting and research design; (2) plural and reflexive foresight practices that shape technological futures; (3) graduate education as a leverage point for cross-disciplinary literacy; (4) visualization and communication as epistemic and civic practices; and (5) institutional frameworks that move beyond rigid distinctions between basic and applied research. Across these dimensions, we propose practical strategies for embedding interdisciplinary collaboration structurally rather than symbolically.

physics.soc-ph↗

arXiv2022

Thermal fluctuations and osmotic stability of lipid vesicles

Biological membranes constantly change their shape in response to external stimuli, and understanding the remodeling and stability of vesicles in heterogeneous environments is therefore of fundamental importance for a range of cellular processes. One crucial question is how vesicles respond to external osmotic stresses, imposed by differences in solute concentrations between the vesicle interior and exterior. Previous analyses of the membrane bending energy have predicted that micron-sized giant unilamellar vesicles (GUVs) should become globally deformed already for nanomolar concentration differences, in contrast to experimental findings that find deformations at much higher osmotic stresses. In this article, we analyze the mechanical stability of a spherical vesicle exposed to an external osmotic pressure in a statistical-mechanical model, including the effect of thermally excited membrane bending modes. We find that the inclusion of thermal fluctuations of the vesicle shape changes renders the vesicle deformation continuous, in contrast to the abrupt transition in the athermal picture. Crucially, however, the predicted critical pressure associated with global vesicle deformation remains the same as when thermal fluctuations are neglected, approximately six orders of magnitude smaller than the typical collapse pressure recently observed experimentally for GUVs. We conclude by discussing possible sources of this persisting dissonance between theory and experiments.

cond-mat.soft↗

arXiv2020

Tortuosity in the Brick and Mortar Model Based on Chemical Conduction

Diffusion is a reoccurring phenomena in many fields and is affected by the geometry in which it takes place. Here we investigate the effects of geometry on diffusion in a Brick and Mortar model system. The tortuous effects are evaluated based on generalized Fick's law, i.e. diffusion driven by differences in chemical potential. The presented formalism gives a general (semi-)exact analytic expression for the tortuosity using impermeable Bricks, which is successfully validated against standard techniques and finite element method results. The approach allows for anisotropic properties of the Mortar, which we show can be significant and is not captured with known analytic techniques. Based on the introduced concept of chemical conductivity we also find generalized Fick's law consistent with Ohm's and Fourier's law in terms of their constituent parts, which further makes the main results for brick and mortar structures directly applicable to diffusion of either charge, heat, or mass.

cond-mat.soft↗