2014-2015

Previous Seminars

May 4, 2014, 2pm

Soft Matter Seminar: Pattern Formation in Thin Elastic Films

Soft Matter Seminar: Pattern Formation in Thin Elastic Films

Dr. Elisabetta Matsumoto, Princeton University Exploiting elastic instabilities in thin films has proven a robust method for creating complex patterns and structures across a…

Location: Regents Hall


May 8, 2014, 11am

Soft Matter Seminar: Polymer Adhesion at Short Contact Time

Soft Matter Seminar: Polymer Adhesion at Short Contact Time

Chelsea S. Davis, NIST In rubber manufacturing, two layers of uncrosslinked rubber are often brought into contact and required to adhere to one another very rapidly. The…

Location: Regents Hall


Nov 3, 2014, 3pm

Soft Matter Seminar: Dynamic Self-assembly of Biomacromolecules at the Single Molecule and Nanoscale Level

Soft Matter Seminar: Dynamic Self-assembly of Biomacromolecules at the Single Molecule and Nanoscale Level

Prof. Joonil Seog, University of Maryland One-dimensional nanostructures are ideal building blocks for functional nanoscale assembly. Peptide based nanofibers have a high…

Location: Regents Hall


Nov 6, 2014, 1pm

Soft Matter Seminar: Bringing Physics into the Fold: Origami-Inspired Mechanical Meta-materials

Soft Matter Seminar: Bringing Physics into the Fold: Origami-Inspired Mechanical Meta-materials

Prof. Itai Cohen, Cornell University Title: Bringing Physics into the Fold: Origami-Inspired Mechanical Meta-materials Tessellated patterns, realistic animals, and curved…

Location: Regents Hall


Nov 7, 2014, 11:30am

Soft Matter Seminar: Drops Behaving Badly

Soft Matter Seminar: Drops Behaving Badly

Drops Behaving Badly Prof. Colin Bain Department of Chemistry, Durham University, UK When fluid dynamics comes up against capillarity, a wide range of interesting…

Location: Regents Hall


Dec 1, 2014, 3pm

Soft Matter Seminar: The Non-monotonic Flow Curves of Shear Thickening Suspensions

Soft Matter Seminar: The Non-monotonic Flow Curves of Shear Thickening Suspensions

Dr. Ryohei Seto, Levich Institute, CUNY Title: The non-monotonic flow curves of shear thickening suspensions The solid particles in a suspension need to reconfigure…

Location: Regents Hall


Jan 9, 2015, 2pm

Soft Matter Seminar: Nanoparticle Organization in Polymer Layers

Soft Matter Seminar: Nanoparticle Organization in Polymer Layers

Dr Jure Dobnikar Soft Matter Centre Beijing University of Chemical Technology (BUCT) The organization of colloids or nanoparticles inside grafted polymer layers is…

Location: Regents Hall


Jan 26, 2015, 3pm

Soft Matter Seminar: Relaxation Dynamics of Binary Lipid Bilayers

Soft Matter Seminar: Relaxation Dynamics of Binary Lipid Bilayers

Professor Shigeyuki Komura Tokyo Metropolitan University We shall discuss theoretically the relaxation dynamics of two-component fluid bilayer membranes in a homogeneous…

Location: Regents Hall


Feb 13, 2015, 3pm

Soft Matter Seminar: AFM Studies of Bilayer Dynamics, Structure and Growth in the Three-Phase Region

Soft Matter Seminar: AFM Studies of Bilayer Dynamics, Structure and Growth in the Three-Phase Region

Anders Aufderhorst-Roberts, School of Physics and Astronomy, University of Leeds Bilayers formed from lipid ternary mixtures are useful model systems for understanding phase…

Location: Regents Hall


Feb 18, 2015, 2:30pm

Soft Matter Seminar: Study of the Transmembrane Potential with Giant Unilamellar Vesicles

Soft Matter Seminar: Study of the Transmembrane Potential with Giant Unilamellar Vesicles

Matthias GARTEN PhD Student, Bassereau Group, “Membranes and Cellular Functions” PhysicoChimie Curie Institut Curie, Paris Abstract: Giant unilamellar vesicles…

Location: Regents Hall


Feb 26, 2015, 3pm

Soft Matter Seminar: Silk Fibroin Structure-function Relationships: Efficient Fiber Spinning and Biomaterial Applications

Soft Matter Seminar: Silk Fibroin Structure-function Relationships: Efficient Fiber Spinning and Biomaterial Applications

Ben Partlow PhD Candidate, Department of Biomedical Engineering Tufts University Silk fibers from the Bombyx Mori silkworm are well known for their impressive strength and…

Location: Regents Hall


Feb 27, 2015, 3pm

Soft Matter Seminar: High-precision Test of Landauer’s Principle in a Feedback Trap

Soft Matter Seminar: High-precision Test of Landauer’s Principle in a Feedback Trap

John Bechhoefer Dept. of Physics Simon Fraser University Abstract: Landauer’s principle, formulated in 1961, postulates that irreversible logical or computational…

Location: Regents Hall


Mar 12, 2015, 3pm

Soft Matter Seminar: Structure-Function Relationships of Self-Assembled Fibrillar Gels

Soft Matter Seminar: Structure-Function Relationships of Self-Assembled Fibrillar Gels

Katie Weigandt PhD NIST Center for Neutron Research Fibrillar gels represent an important class of materials with commercially relevant applications in the cosmetics and…

Location: Regents Hall


Mar 16, 2015, 3pm

Soft Matter Seminar: Mechanics of Surface-attached Bacterial Systems on Single-cell and Multi-cellular Lengthscales

Soft Matter Seminar: Mechanics of Surface-attached Bacterial Systems on Single-cell and Multi-cellular Lengthscales

Vernita Gordon, Assistant Professor of Physics, UT Austin Center for Nonlinear Dynamics Institute for Cellular and Molecular Biology Biofilms are communities of…

Location: Regents Hall


Mar 31, 2015, 3:15pm

Physics Colloquium: Mechanics of Squishy Spheres

Physics Colloquium: Mechanics of Squishy Spheres

Prof. Craig Maloney Department of Mechanical and Industrial Engineering, Northeastern University “Mechanics of Squishy Spheres” Many complex fluids such as emulsions or…

Location: Regents Hall


Apr 23, 2015, 3:30pm

Soft Matter Seminar: Adding Softness to Particles at Fluid-fluid Interfaces

Soft Matter Seminar: Adding Softness to Particles at Fluid-fluid Interfaces

Prof. Dr. Lucio Isa, ETH Zurich Colloidal particles adsorbed at the interface between two fluids play a pivotal role in a large range of applications, e.g. in emulsion and…

Location: Regents Hall


Apr 24, 2015, 11am

Soft Matter Seminar: The Dynamics of Active Matter Particles on Disordered Landscapes: Jamming, Clogging, and Avalanches

Soft Matter Seminar: The Dynamics of Active Matter Particles on Disordered Landscapes: Jamming, Clogging, and Avalanches

Dr. Cynthia Reichhardt Los Alamos National Laboratory http://cnls.lanl.gov/~olson/ There has been tremendous growth in studying nonequilibrium systems in which the…

Location: Regents Hall