Normal deformation of a soft lipid-based microtube in response to the flow generated by a tangential motion of a nearby microbead

Abstract

In this study, we experimentally examine the deformation of a micrometer-scale soft membrane in response to a periodic shear flow. We fabricate long and straight cylindrical-shaped soft microtubes from lipid bilayers as part of this study. A microtube with a diameter of about 1–5 μm is moved parallel to its longitudinal axes. At the same time, a polystyrene microbead, trapped by optical tweezers, is forced to stay near the external surface of the microtube. We study the induced shape deformation in the microtube for different shearing parameters. The effects related to the size of the bead, its distance to the surface of the microtube, and their relative speed are analyzed. The overall results qualitatively demonstrate the impact of shearing on the shape of the soft membrane.