Soft Matter
Concepts, Phenomena, and Applications
- Brownian motion, thermal fluctuations and diffusion
The additional material is organized according to book sections and it includes links to (review) papers mentioned in the book, videos of different phenomena we discuss (experiments and simulations), as well as links to online lectures that address certain topics in more details.
3.1 A matter of scales and description
Brownian motion of pollen grains in water.
From Yeo Yong Kiat.
Brownian motion of micro beads.
From Forrest Charnock.
3.2 Langevin equation for Brownian motion
Lecture by David Williams on the derivation of the Langevin equation.
Lectures on the derivation of the Langevin equation closer to the presentation in our book.
Left: by Enrico Carlon. Right: by Jos Thijssen.
3.3 The Fokker-Planck equation
A lecture by Igor Halperin on the relation between the Langevin and Fokker-Planck equation.
From Englianhu.
3.4 The Master equation
An elementary introduction to the master equation.
From David Liao.
3.5 Size matters for diffusion and dispersion
Index and density matched colloidal crystals, (264.9nm PMMA spheres in decalin/tetralin). Note that the density matched colloids scatter light more intensely after a while, this is because they form colloidal grains which scatter light through Bragg reflection! From Edward Weddle.
3.6 Using fluctuations as a probe
Thermally driven shape fluctuations of a giant lipid vesicle, similar to that shown in figure 3.13.
From Raghuveer Parthasarathy.
A short lecture on optical tweezers.
From Quick Biochemistry Basics.
And a longer lecture by Roop Mallik that
includes many biophysical applications.
From Global BioImaging.
Artist impression of a molecular motor pulling a particle.
From MG Lomb.
Problems
Coding Problems
Our aim is to make coding problems available for all chapters, including this one, by the end of 2025.