Energetics of twisted elastic filament pairs

Fuente: arXiv
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Main Authors: Chopin, Julien, Biswas, Animesh, Kudrolli, Arshad
Format: Preprint
Published: 2023
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author Chopin, Julien
Biswas, Animesh
Kudrolli, Arshad
author_facet Chopin, Julien
Biswas, Animesh
Kudrolli, Arshad
contents We investigate the elastic energy stored in a filament pair as a function of applied twist by measuring torque under prescribed end-to-end separation conditions. We show that the torque increases rapidly to a peak with applied twist when the filaments are initially separate, then decreases to a minimum as the filaments cross and come into contact. The torque then increases again while the filaments form a double helix with increasing twist. A nonlinear elasto-geometric model that combines the effect of geometrical nonlinearities with large stretching and self-twist is shown to capture the evolution of the helical geometry, the torque profile, and the stored energy with twist. We find that a large fraction of the total energy is stored in stretching the filaments, which increases with separation distance and applied tension. We find that only a small fraction of energy is stored in the form of bending energy, and that the contribution due to contact energy is negligible. Our study highlights the consequences of stretchablility on filament twisting which is a fundamental topological transformation relevant to making ropes, tying shoelaces, actuating robots, and the physical properties of entangled polymers.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2309_11344
institution arXiv
publishDate 2023
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Energetics of twisted elastic filament pairs
Chopin, Julien
Biswas, Animesh
Kudrolli, Arshad
Soft Condensed Matter
We investigate the elastic energy stored in a filament pair as a function of applied twist by measuring torque under prescribed end-to-end separation conditions. We show that the torque increases rapidly to a peak with applied twist when the filaments are initially separate, then decreases to a minimum as the filaments cross and come into contact. The torque then increases again while the filaments form a double helix with increasing twist. A nonlinear elasto-geometric model that combines the effect of geometrical nonlinearities with large stretching and self-twist is shown to capture the evolution of the helical geometry, the torque profile, and the stored energy with twist. We find that a large fraction of the total energy is stored in stretching the filaments, which increases with separation distance and applied tension. We find that only a small fraction of energy is stored in the form of bending energy, and that the contribution due to contact energy is negligible. Our study highlights the consequences of stretchablility on filament twisting which is a fundamental topological transformation relevant to making ropes, tying shoelaces, actuating robots, and the physical properties of entangled polymers.
title Energetics of twisted elastic filament pairs
topic Soft Condensed Matter
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2309.11344