Mechanics of tunable helices and geometric frustration in biomimetic seashells
Helical structures are ubiquitous in nature and engineering, ranging from DNA molecules to plant tendrils, from sea snail shells to nanoribbons. While the helical shapes in natural and engineered systems often exhibit nearly uniform radius and pitch, helical shell structures with changing radius and...
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Published in | Europhysics letters Vol. 105; no. 6; p. 64005 |
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Main Authors | , , , , , , , |
Format | Journal Article |
Language | English |
Published |
Les Ulis
EDP Sciences, IOP Publishing and Società Italiana di Fisica
01.03.2014
IOP Publishing |
Subjects | |
Online Access | Get full text |
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Summary: | Helical structures are ubiquitous in nature and engineering, ranging from DNA molecules to plant tendrils, from sea snail shells to nanoribbons. While the helical shapes in natural and engineered systems often exhibit nearly uniform radius and pitch, helical shell structures with changing radius and pitch, such as seashells and some plant tendrils, add to the variety of this family of aesthetic beauty. Here we develop a comprehensive theoretical framework for tunable helical morphologies, and report the first biomimetic seashell-like structure resulting from mechanics of geometric frustration. In previous studies, the total potential energy is everywhere minimized when the system achieves equilibrium. In this work, however, the local energy minimization cannot be realized because of the geometric incompatibility, and hence the whole system deforms into a shape with a global energy minimum whereby the energy in each segment may not necessarily be locally optimized. This novel approach can be applied to develop materials and devices of tunable geometries with a range of applications in nano/biotechnology. |
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Bibliography: | istex:F8784FFA0600910CA85A4A9AEAE972F1E0C2A782 publisher-ID:epl16172 ark:/67375/80W-MHPFZXZW-N ObjectType-Article-1 SourceType-Scholarly Journals-1 ObjectType-Feature-2 content type line 23 |
ISSN: | 0295-5075 1286-4854 |
DOI: | 10.1209/0295-5075/105/64005 |