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Physical Links: defining and detecting inter-chain entanglement

Fluctuating filaments, from densely-packed biopolymers to defect lines in structured fluids, are prone to become interlaced and form intricate architectures. Understanding the ensuing mechanical and relaxation properties depends critically on being able to capture such entanglement in quantitative t...

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Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores principales: Caraglio, Michele, Micheletti, Cristian, Orlandini, Enzo
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Nature Publishing Group UK 2017
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5430864/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/28442725
http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/s41598-017-01200-w
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author Caraglio, Michele
Micheletti, Cristian
Orlandini, Enzo
author_facet Caraglio, Michele
Micheletti, Cristian
Orlandini, Enzo
author_sort Caraglio, Michele
collection PubMed
description Fluctuating filaments, from densely-packed biopolymers to defect lines in structured fluids, are prone to become interlaced and form intricate architectures. Understanding the ensuing mechanical and relaxation properties depends critically on being able to capture such entanglement in quantitative terms. So far, this has been an elusive challenge. Here we introduce the first general characterization of non-ephemeral forms of entanglement in linear curves by introducing novel descriptors that extend topological measures of linking from close to open curves. We thus establish the concept of physical links. This general method is applied to diverse contexts: equilibrated ring polymers, mechanically-stretched links and concentrated solutions of linear chains. The abundance, complexity and space distribution of their physical links gives access to a whole new layer of understanding of such systems and open new perspectives for others, such as reconnection events and topological simplification in dissipative fields and defect lines.
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spelling pubmed-54308642017-05-16 Physical Links: defining and detecting inter-chain entanglement Caraglio, Michele Micheletti, Cristian Orlandini, Enzo Sci Rep Article Fluctuating filaments, from densely-packed biopolymers to defect lines in structured fluids, are prone to become interlaced and form intricate architectures. Understanding the ensuing mechanical and relaxation properties depends critically on being able to capture such entanglement in quantitative terms. So far, this has been an elusive challenge. Here we introduce the first general characterization of non-ephemeral forms of entanglement in linear curves by introducing novel descriptors that extend topological measures of linking from close to open curves. We thus establish the concept of physical links. This general method is applied to diverse contexts: equilibrated ring polymers, mechanically-stretched links and concentrated solutions of linear chains. The abundance, complexity and space distribution of their physical links gives access to a whole new layer of understanding of such systems and open new perspectives for others, such as reconnection events and topological simplification in dissipative fields and defect lines. Nature Publishing Group UK 2017-04-25 /pmc/articles/PMC5430864/ /pubmed/28442725 http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/s41598-017-01200-w Text en © The Author(s) 2017 Open Access This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article’s Creative Commons license, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article’s Creative Commons license and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/.
spellingShingle Article
Caraglio, Michele
Micheletti, Cristian
Orlandini, Enzo
Physical Links: defining and detecting inter-chain entanglement
title Physical Links: defining and detecting inter-chain entanglement
title_full Physical Links: defining and detecting inter-chain entanglement
title_fullStr Physical Links: defining and detecting inter-chain entanglement
title_full_unstemmed Physical Links: defining and detecting inter-chain entanglement
title_short Physical Links: defining and detecting inter-chain entanglement
title_sort physical links: defining and detecting inter-chain entanglement
topic Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5430864/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/28442725
http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/s41598-017-01200-w
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