Elasticity and rheology of soft amorphous materials in the vicinity of an athermal fluid-solid jamming transition

• Applicant: Dr. Claus Heußinger
• Subject Area: Statistical Physics, Nonlinear Dynamics, Complex Systems, Soft and Fluid Matter, Biological Physics ; Theoretical Condensed Matter Physics
• Term: from 2011 to 2018
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 199844864

• Final Report Year: 2018

Final Report Abstract

The grant has allowed me to establish a strong and internationally visible scientific expertise in the context of driven soft materials, with topics ranging from cell rheology to colloidal and granular flow. Given this scientific focus we contribute to topics from material science, but with a clear theoretical physics perspective. The common idea is to understand effective material properties (e.g. modulus, viscosity) on the basis of specific microstructural features, like particle interactions or random microstructure. Next to doing research I have also actively contributed to University education.

Publications

• Free volume under shear, J. Chem. Phys., 143, 144502 (2015)
  M. Maiti, H. A. Vinutha, S. Sastry, C. Heussinger
  
• Athermal rheology of weakly attractive soft particles, Phys. Rev. E 94, 052608 (2016)
  E. Irani, P. Chaudhuri, C. Heussinger
  
• Friction-induced shear thickening: A microscopic perspective, Europhys. Lett. 115, 54006 (2016)
  M. Maiti, A. Zippelius, C. Heussinger
  
• Rheological chaos of frictional grains, Phys. Rev. E 93, 030901(R) (2016)
  M. Grob, A. Zippelius, C. Heussinger
  
• Thermalized connectivity networks of jammed packings, Soft Matter 12, 7682 (2016)
  C. Buss, C. Heussinger, O. Hallatschek