Katie Nicholson, Development Editor

Author Archive

5th International Conference on Self-Healing Materials 2015 Oral Presentation Prize winner

26 Jun 2015

A huge congratulations to Arn Mignon who was awarded the Soft Matter Oral Presentation Prize at the 5th International Conference on Self-Healing Materials (ICSHM2015). The conference took place on the 22 – 24 June 2015 in Durham, USA and was sponsored by Soft Matter.

Arn Mignon is from Ghent University and won the Soft Matter Oral Presentation Prize with his talk titled “Smart super absorbent polymers for self-healing of motar.”

ICSHM2015 focussed on the newly emerging field of self-healing biomaterials, encompassing all classes of self-healing materials including polymers, ceramics, metals, and composites, as well as biomedical implants. Further details about the conference can be found by taking a look at their website.

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Soft Matter’s 2014 Impact Factor is 4.029

19 Jun 2015

Soft Matter is delighted to announce its 2014 Impact Factor is 4.029.

Soft Matter has been dedicated to fundamental soft matter research at the interface of physics, chemistry and biology for the last 10 years. Its impressive Impact Factor of 4.029 is a strong assurance that Soft Matter is a leading journal within the soft matter field.

Our celebratory 10 year Anniversary collection exemplifies the kind of high impact, multidisciplinary soft matter science that Soft Matter aims to publish.

Our fast times to publication ensure that your research is reviewed and announced to the community rapidly.

From receipt, your research papers will be published in 63 days. (Data taken from average manuscript handling times between January – April 2015)

Publishing your research in Soft Matter means that your article will be read and cited by your colleagues.

Our unique combination of high quality articles, outstanding Editorial and Advisory Board, free colour and flexible manuscript format make it clear to see why Soft Matter is the leading journal within the soft matter field.

Our articles encompass a wide range of soft matter research and this is highlighted in these recent Soft Matter articles:

Stretching self-entangled DNA molecules in elongational fields
C. Benjamin Renner and Patrick S. Doyle
Soft Matter, 2015, 11, 3105-3114

A dynamic and self-crosslinked polysaccharide hydrogel with autonomous self-healing ability
Fuyuan Ding, Shuping Wu, Shishuai Wang, Yuan Xiong, Yan Li, Bin Li, Hongbing Deng, Yumin Du, Ling Xiao and Xiaowen Shi
Soft Matter, 2015, 11, 3971-3976

Domain walls and anchoring transitions mimicking nematic biaxiality in the oxadiazole bent-core liquid crystal C7
Young-Ki Kim, Greta Cukrov, Jie Xiang, Sung-Tae Shin and Oleg D. Lavrentovich
Soft Matter, 2015, 11, 3963-3970

Anisotropic colloidal transport and periodic stick-slip motion in cholesteric finger textures
Kui Chen, Linnea P. Metcalf, David P. Rivas, Daniel H. Reich and Robert L. Leheny
Soft Matter, 2015, 11, 4189-4196

Phase separation in ternary fluid mixtures: a molecular dynamics study
Awaneesh Singh and Sanjay Puri
Soft Matter, 2015, 11, 2213-2219

Self-assembly of Janus particles under shear
Emanuela Bianchi, Athanassios Z. Panagiotopoulos and Arash Nikoubashman
Soft Matter, 2015, 11, 3767-3771

So join the many leading scientists that have already chosen to publish in Soft Matter and submit today!

Submit your research

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Recent Appointees in Materials Science 2015 Conference (RAMS2015)

28 May 2015

We are delighted to announce that the Recent Appointees in Materials Science 2015 Conference (RAMS2015) will be held at the University of Warwick on 16-17^th September 2015.

Deadlines and dates

Registration will open shortly so be sure to sign up to this essential meeting before 1^st September 2015! The cost of registration is £125 for accommodation and meals, including the conference banquet at Warwick Castle. A reduced rate of £70 is offered for those not requiring accommodation.

Abstract submissions are now being accepted for oral and poster presentation but make sure you submit your abstracts by the deadline on 30^th June 2015.

Bursaries

A small number of bursaries are available for those with limited travel budgets and will be assessed on an individual basis. Enquire about bursaries here.

Keynote speakers

Biomaterials Science Advisory Board member Andrew Dove (University of Warwick) will be speaking along with other keynote speakers Aron Walsh (University of Bath) and Mary Ryan (Imperial College London). View the full list of invited speakers here.

For full details visit the RAMS2015 website. We hope you can join the materials science community for this fantastic event.

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2015 Soft Matter Lectureship is awarded to Lucio Isa

07 May 2015

We are delighted to announce Professor Lucio Isa (ETH Zurich) as the 2015 Soft Matter Lectureship winner.

The Soft Matter Lectureship is an annual award that honours an early-stage career researcher for their significant contribution to the soft matter field. The recipient is selected by the Soft Matter Editorial Board from a list of candidates nominated by the community.

Read on to find out more about Lucio…

Lucio was presented with his 2015 Soft Matter Lectureship award at the end of his talk at the SoftComp Topical Workshop – Dense Suspension Flow held at the University of Edinburgh on 1-3 June 2015 by Soft Matter Associate Editor Dimitris Vlassopoulos.

Professor Dr Lucio Isa was born in Milan (Italy) in 1979. In 2004 he completed his university studies in Nuclear Engineering with a Mathematics and Physics specialisation at the Milan Polytechnic, obtaining a Master’s degree with honors (100/100 cum laude) with a research project on thermal diffusion of colloidal suspensions with Professor Roberto Piazza. He then moved on to obtain a PhD in Soft Matter Physics at the University of Edinburgh in 2008 (Professor Wilson Poon) where he worked on flow and deformation of dense colloidal glasses. His PhD work was awarded on two occasions (Marie Curie Early Stage Researcher 2007 Award and the British Society of Rheology 2008 Vernon Harrison Award for the most outstanding UK PhD rheology thesis in the academic year 2007/2008). After a short postdoctoral spell in Edinburgh, he moved to the Materials Department of ETH Zurich at the end of 2008 to work on self-assembled materials in the Laboratory for Surface Science and Technology (Professors Nicholas D. Spencer and Marcus Textor). During his time at ETH Zurich he was awarded a Marie Curie Postdoctoral Fellowship, an SNSF travel grant as visiting scientist to the University of California Santa Barbara (Professor Todd Squires) and an SNSF Ambizione Fellowship aimed at studying various aspects of micro and nanoparticle self-assembly at liquid interfaces.

Since 1^st September 2013 he has been head of the Laboratory for Interfaces, Soft matter and Assembly in the Department of Materials at ETH Zurich as SNSF Assistant Professor. His current interests revolve around the basic understanding of soft materials in terms of their structural, dynamical and mechanical properties, with a specific focus on single-particle wetting and on the rheology of colloidal monolayers and dense pastes. This basic understanding is then applied to the engineering of new materials and processes, including multifunctional colloids, optically active materials and surface nanopatterning.

Professor Isa is a co-founder of Swiss Soft Days, an initiative aimed at creating a national network of scientists working in Soft Matter in Switzerland. He has published 45 peer-reviewed articles in international scientific journals to date and he is the 2015 recipient of the Soft Matter Lectureship award.

Lucio’s most recent Soft Matter articles include:

A multiscale approach to the adsorption of core–shell nanoparticles at fluid interfaces
Adrienne Nelson, Dapeng Wang, Kaloian Koynov and Lucio Isa
Soft Matter, 2015, 11, 118-129

Highly ordered 2D microgel arrays: compression versus self-assembly
Karen Geisel, Walter Richtering and Lucio Isa
Soft Matter, 2014, 10, 7968-7976

Keep your eyes peeled for Lucio’s upcoming Soft Matter article in honour of the Lectureship award.

We would like to thank everybody who nominated a candidate for the Lectureship; we received many excellent nominations, and the Editorial Board had a difficult task in choosing between some outstanding candidates.

Please join us in congratulating Lucio in his fantastic achievements by adding your comments below.

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Soft Matter welcomes new Advisory Board members Bradley Olsen and Thomas Epps III

30 Apr 2015

We are delighted to welcome two new Advisory Board members to the Soft Matter team: Bradley Olsen (Massachusetts Institute of Technology, USA) and Thomas Epps III (University of Delaware, USA).

I hope you’ll join us in giving a warm welcome to Bradley and Thomas in their new posts as Soft Matter Advisory Board members.

Bradley Olsen’s interests lie in investigating the relationships between molecular structure and self-assembly, applying concepts from block copolymer assembly and polymer gels in order to understand complex biohybrid materials. His research endeavours to extend the capability of soft materials such as engineering plastics, energy converters, catalysts, and biomedical hydrogels. One of his recent articles will be featured as part of Soft Matter’s upcoming web collection to celebrate the journals 10th Anniversary.

Take a look at Bradley Olsen’s recent Soft Matter papers and learn more about his research:

Celebrating Soft Matter‘s 10th Anniversary: Chain configuration and rate-dependent mechanical properties in transient networks
Michelle K. Sing, Zhen-Gang Wang, Gareth H. McKinley and Bradley D. Olsen
Soft Matter, 2015, 11, 2085-2096

Coil fraction-dependent phase behaviour of a model globular protein–polymer diblock copolymer
Carla S. Thomas and Bradley D. Olsen
Soft Matter, 2014, 10, 3093-3102

Thomas Epps III focusses on designing, synthesising, and characterising new polymeric materials exhibiting molecular level self-assembly. His research is applicable to a range of fields, such as battery and fuel cell membranes, analytical separations membranes, nanoscale containers and scaffolds for targeted drug delivery and surface responsive materials. His most recent Soft Matter article was highlighted as a Hot article and featured in the 2014 Soft Matter Hot Papers web collection.

Find out more about Thomas Epps III’s research by reading these recent articles:

Biobased building blocks for the rational design of renewable block polymers
Angela L. Holmberg, Kaleigh H. Reno, Richard P. Wool and Thomas H. Epps, III
Soft Matter, 2014, 10, 7405-7424

Poly(methyl methacrylate-block-vinyl-m-triphenylamine): synthesis by RAFT polymerization and melt-state self-assembly
Sarah E. Mastroianni, Joseph P. Patterson, Rachel K. O’Reilly and Thomas H. Epps, III
Soft Matter, 2013, 9, 10146-10154

If you have enjoyed reading Bradley’s and Thomas’s recent articles, why not submit your next paper to Soft Matter?

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Nanoparticle Assembly: From Fundamentals to Applications, 7 – 9 January 2016

31 Mar 2015

The upcoming Faraday Discussions meeting on Nanoparticle Assembly: From Fundamentals to Applications will be held in Mumbai, India on 7^th – 9^th January 2016. Sanat Kumar, Charusita Chakravarty and the rest of the Scientific Committee look forward to welcoming you to this exciting event.

Important Dates

Abstract submission is now OPEN, please submit your abstract here. The deadline for oral abstract submission is 20^th April 2015. Make sure you submit your poster abstract by 26^th October 2015.

Early bird registration closes on 16^th November 2015. Why not register now?

For the full list of dates please follow the link.

Keynote Speakers

Confirmed speakers include Nicholas Kotov, Daan Frenkel, Jayant Singh and Andrea Tao. Take a look at the full list of invited speakers here. Soft Matter Chair, Michael Rubinstein, will conclude the meeting with his closing remarks. The full programme will be available to download here.

Themes

This Faraday Discussion will focus on the rapidly evolving field of nanoparticle (NP) self- and driven assembly, with a view to understanding how evolving developments in the fundamentals can be translated into science/property principles underpinning applications. The meeting will contain four themes:

Synthesis and Assembly of Nanoparticles and their Assemblies
Modelling and Theory
Nanocomposites
Applications to Soft Matter

For more information about this exciting event please head to the website.

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Building Next-Generation Superplasticisers from Plant-Derived Lignin

24 Feb 2015

Superplasticisers are a class of materials used to inhibit aggregation in hydraulic cement, improving workability and reducing water requirements without sacrificing strength. Most superplasticisers are anionic polymer dispersants, such as the leading commercial products, polycarboxylate ethers. A low-cost alternative to this class of materials is provided by the plant-derived biopolymer lignin. Lignin is an abundant biopolymer as it is found in most land plants as a component in cell walls. However, Lignin-based substances are poorly performing plasticisers and attempts to significantly improve their properties by copolymerisation with synthetic monomers have thus far been relatively unsuccessful.

In this recent report Gupta et al. provide an alternate approach to the production of high-performance superplasticisers by utilising lignin as a macroinitiator for a reverse addition-fragmentation chain-transfer (RAFT) polymerisation. RAFT is a controlled radical polymerisation technique, which affords good control of molecular weight and polydispersity. Acrylamide was polymerised from the lignin surface in order to create grafted architectures composed of lignin cores with synthetic polyacrylamide coronas. It is found that the lignin compounds synthesised using RAFT polymerisation are more efficient superplasticisers than those prepared by free radical polymerisation, due to their unique polymer-grafted architecture.

The resulting lignin based materials reduced the yield stress of cement paste to similar levels as a leading commercial superplasticiser at concentrations ten-fold lower. These compounds have excellent potential as next-generation admixtures for hydraulic cement, with further work needed to clarify optimal grafting density and length of coronal polymer-chains.


Comparison of physical properties of cement with different superplasticisers

To findout more read the full article below:

Molecular Architecture Requirements for Polymer-Grafted Lignin Superplasticizers by Chetali Gupta, Madeline J. Sverdlove and Newell R. Washburn, Soft Matter, 2015, Advance Article. DOI: 10.1039/C4SM02675F

This post was written by web writer Rob Woodward. Rob is currently based in Imperial College London working in the Polymer and Composite Engineering (PaCE) group. Rob has a background in both responsive polymeric surfactants and microporous organic polymers for carbon capture and storage.

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Soft Matter Prize Winners at 26th Symposium of the Research Group on Polymer Gels

20 Feb 2015

Congratulations go to Matsushita Takuto, Michika Onoda and Kenta Kokado who all won Soft Matter sponsored prizes at the 26th Symposium of the Research Group on Polymer Gels, The Society of Polymer Science held in Tokyo, Japan on 19th-20th January 2015.

: From left to right: Chair: Takao Aoyagi, Prize winners: Matsushita Takuto, Michika Onoda and Kenta Kokado and Royal Society of Chemistry Manager: Hiromitsu Urakami

The Soft Matter poster award was won by Matsushita Takuto who is based at the University of Tokyo, Japan.

The Soft Matter Presentation Award was awarded to Assistant Professor Kenta Kokado who is based at Hokkaido University. Kenta’s research interests are organic and polymer synthesis.

Michika Onoda won the Soft Matter Student Presentation Award. Michika works at the University of Tokyo, Japan.

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Joint Biomaterials Science and Soft Matter ‘Silk and silk-inspired materials’ Web Collection

09 Jan 2015

Take a look at the ‘Silk and silk-inspired materials’ web collection, a joint venture by Biomaterials Science and Soft Matter.

Are you interested in why spider silk is so strong? Or maybe you’re intrigued to find out how silk can be utilised in cell delivery? Whatever your curiosity be sure to check out the ‘Silk and silk-inspired materials’ web collection and find out why this growing area of research is proving so popular!

The web collection features articles from both Biomaterials Science and Soft Matter by leading authors from around the world. The collection contains a range of article types which cover the properties and rheology of silk-inspired materials as well as investigations into the surface properties of spider silk particles. Please follow the link to read all the articles in this popular area of research.

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Soft Matter Lectureship: Nominations now open

09 Jan 2015

Do you know someone who deserves recognition for their contribution to the soft matter field?

Now is your chance to ensure they receive the accolade they deserve.

Soft Matter is pleased to announce that nominations are now being accepted for its Soft Matter Lectureship 2015. This annual lectureship was established in 2009 to honour an early-stage career scientist who has made a significant contribution to the soft matter field.

Previous winners include:

Eric Dufresne Eric Furst Patrick Doyle

2014 – Eric Dufresne, based at Yale University, USA

2013 – Eric Furst, from the University of Delaware, USA

2012 – Patrick Doyle, based at MIT, USA

2011 – Michael J. Solomon, from the University of Michigan, USA

2010 – Bartosz Grzybowski, based at Northwestern University, USA

2009 – Emanuela Zaccarelli, from Sapienza University of Rome, Italy

Qualification

To be eligible for the Soft Matter Lectureship, the candidate should be in the earlier stages of their scientific career, typically within 15 years of attaining their doctorate or equivalent degree, and will have made a significant contribution to the field.

Description

The recipient of the award will be asked to present a lecture three times, one of which will be located in the home country of the recipient. The Soft Matter Editorial Office will provide the sum of £1000 to the recipient for travel and accommodation costs.

The award recipient will be presented with the award at one of the three award lectures. They will also be asked to contribute a lead article to the journal and will have their work showcased on the back cover of the issue in which their article is published.

Selection

The recipient of the award will be selected and endorsed by the Soft Matter Editorial Board.

Nominations

Those wishing to make a nomination should send details of the nominee, including a brief C.V. (no longer than 2 pages A4) together with a letter (no longer than 2 pages A4) supporting the nomination, to the Soft Matter Editorial Office by 6th March 2015. Self-nomination is not permitted.

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