Kavli Affiliate: Anna V. Shneidman | First 5 Authors: Alireza Shahsafi, Graham Joe, Soeren Brandt, Anna V. Shneidman, Nicholas Stanisic | Summary: Engineered optical absorbers are of substantial interest for applications ranging from stray light reduction to energy conversion. We demonstrate a large-area (centimeter-scale) metamaterial that features near-unity frequency-selective absorption in the mid-infrared wavelength range. […]

Kavli Affiliate: Robert J. Wood | First 5 Authors: Neel Doshi, Kaushik Jayaram, Samantha Castellanos, Scott Kuindersma, Robert J Wood | Summary: Limitations in actuation, sensing, and computation have forced small legged robots to rely on carefully tuned, mechanically mediated leg trajectories for effective locomotion. Recent advances in manufacturing, however, have enabled the development of […]

Kavli Affiliate: Radhika Nagpal | First 5 Authors: Daniel S. Calovi, Paul Bardunias, Nicole Carey, J. Scott Turner, Radhika Nagpal | Summary: Termite colonies construct towering, complex mounds, in a classic example of distributed agents coordinating their activity via interaction with a shared environment. The traditional explanation for how this coordination occurs focuses on the […]

Kavli Affiliate: David Weitz | First 5 Authors: Andrea Montessori, Marco Lauricella, Elad Stolovicki, David Weitz, Sauro Succi | Summary: Fully three-dimensional, time-dependent, direct simulations of the non-ideal Navier-Stokes equations for a two-component fluid, shed light into the mechanism which inhibits droplet breakup in step emulsifiers below a critical threshold of the the width-to-height ($w/h$) […]

Kavli Affiliate: Zhigang Suo | First 5 Authors: Yukun Xia, Jikun Wang, Ruisen Yang, Tongqing Lu, Tiejun Wang | Summary: Magnetic elastomers deform under a magnetic field, working as a soft actuator. Untethered microbot made of magnetic elastomers have great potentials in performing medical tasks inside human body as mini doctors. However, the lack of […]

Kavli Affiliate: George Whitesides | First 5 Authors: George Whitesides, , , , | Summary: George Whitesides is a Woodford L. and Ann A. Flowers Professor at Harvard University. In this contribution he describes the development of microfluidic techniques, from the spark that ignited this branch of academic research and its industrial sibling, to potential […]

Kavli Affiliate: David Weitz | First 5 Authors: Andrea Montessori, Marco Lauricella, Michele La Rocca, Sauro Succi, Elad Stolovicki | Summary: We present a regularized version of the color gradient lattice Boltzmann (LB) scheme for the simulation of droplet formation in microfluidic devices of experimental relevance. The regularized version is shown to provide computationally efficient […]

Kavli Affiliate: Anna V. Shneidman | First 5 Authors: Ian B. Burgess, Navid Abedzadeh, Theresa M. Kay, Anna V. Shneidman, Derek J. Cranshaw | Summary: Although complex, hierarchical nanoscale geometries with tailored degrees of disorder are commonly found in biological systems, few simple self-assembly routes to fabricating synthetic analogues have been identified. We present two […]

Kavli Affiliate: Radhika Nagpal | First 5 Authors: Alejandro Cornejo, Radhika Nagpal, , , | Summary: This paper studies the problem of having mobile robots in a multi-robot system maintain an estimate of the relative position and relative orientation of near-by robots in the environment. This problem is studied in the context of large swarms […]

Kavli Affiliate: David Weitz | First 5 Authors: David Issadore, Katherine J. Humphry, Keith A. Brown, Lori Sandberg, David Weitz | Summary: We present a technique to locally and rapidly heat water drops in microfluidic devices with microwave dielectric heating. Water absorbs microwave power more efficiently than polymers, glass, and oils due to its permanent […]