Phase transition of triangulated spherical surfaces with elastic skeletons

Abstract

A first-order transition is numerically found in a spherical surface model with skeletons, which are linked to each other at junctions. The shape of the triangulated surfaces is maintained by skeletons, which have a one-dimensional bending elasticity characterized by the bending rigidity $b$, and the surfaces have no two-dimensional bending elasticity except at the junctions. The surfaces swell and become spherical at large $b$ and collapse and crumple at small $b$. These two phases are separated from each other by the first-order transition. Although both of the surfaces and the skeleton are allowed to self-intersect and, hence, phantom, our results indicate a possible phase transition in biological or artificial membranes whose shape is maintained by cytoskeletons.

arXiv comment15 pages with 10 figures

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Cited by in corpus (9)

• Entropic rigidity of a crumpling network in a randomly folded thin sheet
• Phase transition of compartmentalized surface models
• Shape transformation transitions of a tethered surface model
• Phase structure of a spherical surface model on fixed connectivity meshes
• Non-trivial effect of the in-plane shear elasticity on the phase transitions of fixed-connectivity meshwork models
• Phase transition of meshwork models for spherical membranes
• Spherical surface models with directors
• Shape transformation transitions in a model of fixed-connectivity surfaces supported by skeletons
• Phase transition of triangulated spherical surfaces supported by elastic chains with rigid junctions