Prof. P. B. Sunil Kumar
Department of Physics

Complex Fluids and
Biological Physics Laboratory
&
Centre of Excellence in
Soft and Biological Matter (CSBM) @IIT Madras

Prof. P B Sunil Kumar

Chair Professor
Department of Physics
Indian Institute of Technology, Madras

From left to right: Deepak Kumar, Aathira Murali, Monika Chaudhary, P. B. Sunil Kumar, Anubrata Saha, Ritu Raj, Siji S. Saju, Akash Singh, Shubhendu Shekhar Khali

At Complex Fluids and Biological Physics group the researchers are interested in understanding the structure and dynamics of soft and biological materials through theoretical modelling and computer simulations. Primary interest of the group is in non-equilibrium steady state properties of these materials.

As a part of CSBM our work is focused on understanding of the chromatin organization, shapes of biological membranes and cytoskeletal organization. We believe these studies are of importance in understanding the physics of structure and organization of biological systems. We have proposed a novel polymer model for chromatin that include the effects of structure modifying chemical reactions. We have developed a variety of powerful simulation techniques to study the dynamics of multi-component fluid membranes and membranes with protein like inclusions. We are also interested in the interplay of cytoskeleton tension and membrane elasticity.

With the aim to understand the physical mechanisms leading to convoluted shapes of cellular organelles, we investigate the steady state shapes of vesicle subjected to active fission and fusion from the outer surface. Our study on active polymers, that are semi flexible elastic filaments immersed in a viscous fluid with energy converting “active” elements distributed along its length, is aimed at modeling cytoskeletal filaments. In the past we have also looked into a 3D model with elastic filaments and molecular motors to study the response of cytoskeleton mimicking networks to external forces and pattern formation in mixtures of molecular motors and microtubules.
All the above was possible due to incredible hard work put in by the present and past members of the lab (LinkedIn) and other distinguished collaborators (LinkedIn ).