Abstract: In many constraint systems, from paintings to muddy soils, the evaporation of a solvent leads to the formation of complex drying patterns. Often these patterns are characterized by brittle straight cracks due to the small critical failure deformation of the shrinking material. In this talk I will report the observation of new morphologies during the drying of highly stretchable hydrogels confined between two glass plates. The evaporation front advances by nucleating cavities intermittently, leading either to a disordered or a “worm-like” network structure. For a given experiment, at long time scales, we observe cavities with a well define average size that can be rescaled across our experimental range by a single elasto-capillary dimensionless number. We propose a scaling relationship based on volume conservation and a balance between elasticity and surface energy that is consistent with our data. In a second part, I will introduce my current outreach activity in the context of a residency at the school of the art institute of Chicago, where I teach a class on pattern formation to art students, and further develop my artwork. “Shapes of Emergence” is a live performance based on experimental physics of self-organization, where patterns are filmed and projected with custom devices, that merge approaches in experimental physics with music and video game controllers. Along with musicians, audio-visual narratives that are partly improvised emerge, and place the performer at an edge of natural and creative forms.
Bio: I am currently a staff scientist at the University of Chicago, working in the Jaeger Lab at the intersection of granular matter and soft robotics. I am also currently in residence at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, where I teach physics to art student, co-curate their “Conversation on Art and Science” series, and further develop a multimedia performance involving physics of fluids and soft matter. I did my PhD at Sorbonne University in Paris under the supervision of Elisabeth Bouchaud, and my Post-Docs at Harvard (L. Mahadevan) and MIT (I. Bischofberger). In my research, I am interested in understanding and using self-organization in soft materials to design new soft and modular robotics principles.
Host: Professor Mattia Gazzola
