Researchers discover that hairpins can make a polymer spaghetti fluid
Thursday, October 9, 2014 - 07:00
in Physics & Chemistry
Researchers from FOM Institute AMOLF and the German Forschungzentrum Jülich have discovered why polymers in a solution become fluid if the solution is stirred. They discovered that the polymer structure changes from an entanglement of spaghetti into aligned layers of hairpin-shaped filaments that can slide past each other. The discovery can help to provide a better understanding of biological processes such as flows in the cells of embryos. The results of the research are published on 9 October 2014 in Nature Communications.