Inherently unstable networks collapse to a critical point
M Sheinman1,2, A Sharma1,3, J Alvarado4,5
1Department of Physics and Astronomy, VU University, Amsterdam, The Netherlands.
Abstract:
Nonequilibrium systems that are driven or drive themselves towards a critical point have been studied for almost three decades. Here we present a minimalist example of such a system, motivated by experiments on collapsing active elastic networks. Our model of an unstable elastic network exhibits a collapse towards a critical point from any macroscopically connected initial configuration. Taking into account steric interactions within the network, the model qualitatively and quantitatively reproduces results of the experiments on collapsing active gels.
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