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Updated: Feb 26, 2026
Impression Cytology of the Lid Wiper Area
Published on: August 9, 2016
The smectic order of wrinkles
Hillel Aharoni1, Desislava V Todorova1, Octavio Albarrán2
1Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 19104, USA.
Abstract:
A thin elastic sheet lying on a soft substrate develops wrinkled patterns when subject to an external forcing or as a result of geometric incompatibility. Thin sheet elasticity and substrate response equip such wrinkles with a global preferred wrinkle spacing length and with resistance to wrinkle curvature. These features are responsible for the liquid crystalline smectic-like behaviour of such systems at intermediate length scales. This insight allows better understanding of the wrinkling patterns seen in such systems, with which we explain pattern breaking into domains, the properties of domain walls and wrinkle undulation. We compare our predictions with numerical simulations and with experimental observations.
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