Themed collection Soft Matter Most Popular 2025 Articles

Intelligent soft matter is an emergent field.

We review the recent theoretical and simulation studies on interactions between curvature-inducing proteins and membranes.

This review clarifies the structure–process–property relationship in PVA-based polarizers.

Nanoprecipitation is a versatile, low-energy technique for synthesizing nanomaterials through phase separation, enabling precise tuning of nanomaterial properties.

Peptide-mediated liquid–liquid phase separation (LLPS) underpins the formation of dynamic biomolecular condensates, regulated by diverse molecular interactions, and highlights potential applications in drug delivery and synthetic biology.

This review explores network designs that address the trade-off between toughness and elasticity, offering strategies to develop materials with both high fracture resistance and low hysteresis for advanced applications.

We present a new model for flocks of active colloids that are sustained purely via repulsive torques and short-ranged excluded volume repulsions. Our mechanism: flocking from sliding of pair colloids by an optimal distance while turning away.

A dynamic light scattering study of director fluctuations in the antiferroelectric (AF) phase of the ferroelectric nematic liquid crystal DIO is reported.

Microfluidic experiments show droplets coalescence criteria with viscosity ratio and surfactant concentration, and non-monotonic film drainage time is observed.

Patterns with long- and short-range order in a monolayer of a self-assembling mixture of particles or macromolecules are studied by MD simulations in a generic model inspired by biological and soft matter systems.

We uncover a new class of two-dimensional active systems with internal stresses which display long-range structural order and hyperuniformity. This notably includes models of two-dimensional biological tissues surrounded by a dissipative medium.

Green microemulsions based on bio-derived and eco-friendly surfactants enhance cleaning efficacy, aligning with environmental conservation and cultural heritage preservation.

Emulsion gels are soft-solid materials with a composite structure consisting of an oil phase within a gel matrix.

Prediction of frictional contact network in suspensions employing graph neural network.

Ostwald ripening of crystalline and amorphous nanoparticle dispersions of a model organic compound are compared.

Urea has environmental, agricultural and clinical importance being present in many bodily fluids including blood, urine, tears and sweat.

Tailoring the alkyl groups of biparental polyelectrolytes in the Janus evaporator effectively disrupts water hydrogen bonding, achieving a low water evaporation enthalpy of 1434 J g⁻¹ and an evaporation rate of 4.1 kg m⁻² h⁻¹.

Using rheo-electric measurements, we revealed a power-law scaling that quantitatively describes the shear rheology of lithium-ion battery slurry, and identified shear-induced structure memory through the carbon-phase electrical conductivity.

The present article deals with the modulation of oscillatory electroosmotic flow (EOF) and solute dispersion across a nanochannel filled with an electrolyte solution surrounded by a layer of a dielectric liquid.

We report the appearance of a liquid crystal phase having isotropic symmetry obtained by cooling a ferroelectric nematic with saturated polar order, a surprising new phenomen of the ferroelectric nematic realm.