Characterization of “Star” Droplet Morphologies Induced by Charged Macromolecules
Bibliographic record
Abstract
"Star" morphologies of charged liquid droplets are distinct droplet conformations that, for a certain charge squared to volume ratio, have lower energy than their spherically shaped analogues. For these shapes to appear, the charge should be carried by a single ionic species. A typical example of a charge carrier that we employ in this study is a fully charged double-stranded oligodeoxynucleotide (dsDNA) in an aqueous and an acetonitrile droplet. We characterize the structure and dynamics of the star-shaped droplets. We find that by increasing the charge squared to volume ratio, the droplet evolves from spherical to "spiky" shapes, by first passing from droplet sizes that undergo enhanced shape fluctuations relative to those of the larger spherical droplets. These fluctuations mark the onset of the instability. We also find that in the spiky droplet, the orientation of the solvent molecules in the first shell about the dsDNA is very close to that in the bulk solution. However, this orientation is substantially different farther away from the dsDNA. With regards to dynamics, the motion of the spikes is reflected in the autocorrelation functions of rotationally invariant order parameters that show a damped oscillator form of decay, indicative of the elastic motion of the spikes. We compare the formation of spikes with that of the ferrofluids and the dielectric materials in an electric field, and we conclude that they represent a different entity that deserves its own characterization. The study provides insight into the manner in which the charge distribution may give rise to well-controlled droplet morphologies and calls for experiments in this direction.
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How this classification was reachedexpand
Full frame machine prediction
Teacher imitationNot calibrated prevalence, not ground truth. Human validation pending. The Gemma side is a direct model label for every work in the frame, read from the title-only record. The Codex side is a classifier learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and calibrated to design-weighted sample rates; fields without enough sample support carry no Codex call. Candidate is the union of the two sides; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels.
Distilled classifier scores by category (both heads)
| Category | Codex | Gemma |
|---|---|---|
| Metaresearch | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Meta-epidemiology (narrow) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Meta-epidemiology (broad) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Bibliometrics | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Science and technology studies | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Scholarly communication | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Open science | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Research integrity | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Insufficient payload (model declined to judge) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
Machine scores (provisional)
The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.
Baseline scores from an immature model (maturity gate not passed, 7 training rounds). Scores rank; they never assert a category.
score_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from itClassification
machine, unvalidatedMachine predicted; a candidate call from one source (direct Gemma or distilled Codex), not a consensus.
How this classification was reached, model by model and score by score, is at the end of the page under "How this classification was reached".