I am a third-year DPhil student working in the group of Prof. Julia Yeomans. I am working on active nematics which are promising avenues for understanding biological systems, such as living cells. I am interested in building continuum models and using both analytical and numerical approaches to understand the emergent properties of living materials.
Research interests
Soft condensed matter physics
Mathematical modelling of collective phenomena
Active matter
Selected publications
Active Extensile Stress Promotes 3D Director Orientations and Flows
Physical Review Letters 128 (4), 048001
Abstract:
We use numerical simulations and linear stability analysis to study an active nematic layer where the director is allowed to point out of the plane. Our results highlight the difference between extensile and contractile systems. Contractile stress suppresses the flows perpendicular to the layer and favors in-plane orientations of the director. By contrast extensile stress promotes instabilities that can turn the director out of the plane, leaving behind a population of distinct, in-plane regions that continually elongate and divide. This supports extensile forces as a mechanism for the initial stages of layer formation in living systems, and we show that a planar drop with extensile (contractile) activity grows into three dimensions (remains in two dimensions). The results also explain the propensity of disclination lines in three dimensional active nematics to be of twist type in extensile or wedge type in contractile materials.
The role of friction in multidefect ordering
Physical Review Letters American Physical Society 125 (2020) 218004
Activity induced nematic order in isotropic liquid crystals
Journal of Statistical Physics Springer Nature 7:4 (2020) E229-E237
Memory effects, arches and polar defect ordering at the cross-over from wet to dry active nematics
Soft Matter Royal Society of Chemistry 17:9 (2021) 2500-2511