Constitutive Correlations for Mass Transport in Fibrous Media Based on Asymptotic Homogenization

Mass transport in textiles is crucial. Knowledge of effective mass transport properties of textiles can be used to improve processes and applications where textiles are used. Mass transfer in knitted and woven fabrics strongly depends on the yarn used. In particular, the permeability and effective diffusion coefficient of yarns are of interest. Correlations are often used to estimate the mass transfer properties of yarns. These correlations commonly assume an ordered distribution, but here we demonstrate that an ordered distribution leads to an overestimation of mass transfer properties. We therefore address the impact of random ordering on the effective diffusivity and permeability of yarns and show that it is important to account for the random arrangement of fibers in order to predict mass transfer. To do this, Representative Volume Elements are randomly generated to represent the structure of yarns made from continuous filaments of synthetic materials. Furthermore, parallel, randomly arranged fibers with a circular cross-section are assumed. By solving the so-called cell problems on the Representative Volume Elements, transport coefficients can be calculated for given porosities. These transport coefficients, which are based on a digital reconstruction of the yarn and asymptotic homogenization, are then used to derive an improved correlation for the effective diffusivity and permeability as a function of porosity and fiber diameter. At porosities below 0.7, the predicted transport is significantly lower under the assumption of random ordering. The approach is not limited to circular fibers and may be extended to arbitrary fiber geometries.

Interplay of Hydropathy and Heterogeneous Diffusion in the Molecular Transport within Lamellar Lipid Mesophases

Lipid mesophases are being intensively studied as potential candidates for drug-delivery purposes. Extensive experimental characterization has unveiled a wide palette of release features depending on the nature of the host lipids and of the guest molecule, as well as on the environmental conditions. However, only a few simulation works have addressed the matter, which hampers a solid rationalization of the richness of outcomes observed in experiments. Particularly, to date, there are no theoretical works addressing the impact of hydropathy on the transport of a molecule within lipid mesophases, despite the significant fraction of hydrophobic molecules among currently-available drugs. Similarly, the high heterogeneity of water mobility in the nanoscopic channels within lipid mesophases has also been neglected. To fill this gap, we introduce here a minimal model to account for these features in a lamellar geometry, and systematically study the role played by hydropathy and water-mobility heterogeneity by Brownian-dynamics simulations. We unveil a fine interplay between the presence of free-energy barriers, the affinity of the drug for the lipids, and the reduced mobility of water in determining the net molecular transport. More in general, our work is an instance of how multiscale simulations can be fruitfully employed to assist experiments in release systems based on lipid mesophases.

Enhanced locomotion, effective diffusion and trapping of undulatory micro-swimmers in heterogeneous environments

Swimming cells and microorganisms must often move through complex fluids that contain an immersed microstructure such as polymer molecules or filaments. In many important biological processes, such as mammalian reproduction and bacterial infection, the size of the immersed microstructure is comparable to that of the swimming cells. This leads to discrete swimmer-microstructure interactions that alter the swimmer's path and speed. In this paper, we use a combination of detailed simulation and data-driven stochastic models to examine the motion of a planar undulatory swimmer in an environment of spherical obstacles tethered via linear springs to random points in the plane of locomotion. We find that, depending on environmental parameters, the interactions with the obstacles can enhance swimming speeds or prevent the swimmer from moving at all. We also show how the discrete interactions produce translational and angular velocity fluctuations that over time lead to diffusive behaviour primarily due to the coupling of swimming and rotational diffusion. Our results demonstrate that direct swimmer-microstructure interactions can produce changes in swimmer motion that may have important implications for the spreading of cell populations in or the trapping of harmful pathogens by complex fluids.

Fate of a mutation in a fluctuating environment

Natural environments are never truly constant, but the evolutionary implications of temporally varying selection pressures remain poorly understood. Here we investigate how the fate of a new mutation in a fluctuating environment depends on the dynamics of environmental variation and on the selective pressures in each condition. We find that even when a mutation experiences many environmental epochs before fixing or going extinct, its fate is not necessarily determined by its time-averaged selective effect. Instead, environmental variability reduces the efficiency of selection across a broad parameter regime, rendering selection unable to distinguish between mutations that are substantially beneficial and substantially deleterious on average. Temporal fluctuations can also dramatically increase fixation probabilities, often making the details of these fluctuations more important than the average selection pressures acting on each new mutation. For example, mutations that result in a trade-off between conditions but are strongly deleterious on average can nevertheless be more likely to fix than mutations that are always neutral or beneficial. These effects can have important implications for patterns of molecular evolution in variable environments, and they suggest that it may often be difficult for populations to maintain specialist traits, even when their loss leads to a decline in time-averaged fitness.

A 3-dimensional tumor growth inhibition assay for testing monoclonal antibody cytotoxicity

A 3-dimensional tumor growth inhibition assay [18] has been adapted to test the cytotoxic activity of a panel of monoclonal antibodies directed to various antigenic determinants on the surface of mouse mammary tumor cells. Target cells can be prepared from either cultured cells or from pieces of fresh tumor. Antibody and complement are added when cells are growing actively and cell growth can be measured, non destructively, over a 7-10-day period. Effective diffusion of antibody through collagen gel and binding to target cells embedded in the gel is demonstrated by indirect immunofluorescent staining. The specificity of monoclonal antibody AMT 101 cytotoxicity for mouse mammary tumor cells is the same in trypan blue exclusion assays of single-cell suspensions as in collagen gel assays, with complete killing seen in the collagen gel assay only. The collagen gel assay allows the testing of repeated treatments in vitro, as well as combined treatment with multiple antibodies. It also allows cell-cell interaction and preserves all cell components in the tumor. The collagen gel assay has potential as a method of predicting the outcome of monoclonal antibody treatment of solid tumors.