Category Archives: Filaments

Filaments

Polymers and filaments in confined geometries

Imagine the filaments forming the cytoskeleton of a cell.  They are confined within the cell membrane.  Not only do these filaments influence how the cell might  behave mechanically, but how the filaments behave is coupled to the restricted space in which they grow, arrange or combine into networks.  Similarly one can think of polymers inside… Read More »

Paper: Molecular dynamics simulations of polymer systems under geometrical confinement

Arash Azari, Kristian K. Müller-Nedebock “Entropic competition in polymeric systems under geometrical confinement”, EPL 110 68004 doi:10.1209/0295-5075/110/68004 (alternatively, http://arxiv.org/abs/1408.5312) We present simulations of alternating copolymers of segments of different stiffness that are confined within regions.  Mixtures of different chains then have different arrangements depending on the size of the confining region. In another paper we shall be… Read More »

Collaborator: Ben Loos

Dr Ben Loos (Dept of Physiological Sciences at Stellenbosch University) has a long-standing interest in the molecular mechanisms that control cell death susceptibility. His research centres around protein degradative mechanisms and their dynamics, transport and function of mitochondria along tubulin networks and their role in neuronal degeneration and migration.  His research group utilizes in vitro… Read More »

Nanobiophysics

The organisation and dynamics of intracellular structures that maintain a cell’s form, shape, function and viability are rather complex. An emerging central theme which addresses this complexity deals with ATP-driven intracellular transport mechanisms along the tubulin network or the ability of mitochondria to rapidly undergo fission and fusion, and thereby creating a network that is adapted to… Read More »