John S. Biggins
John S. Biggins

Contact

TCM Group
Cavendish Laboratory
JJ Thomson Avenue
Cambridge CB3 0HE
United Kingdom


Contact

Division C
Engineering Dept
Trumpington St,
Cambridge CB2 1PZ
United Kingdom

jsb56@cam.ac.uk
+44 (0) 1223 7 60502

 

Papers

Below is a very rough and ready list of my publications. A better curated list is available the soft mechanics website.


  1. Andrea Giudici and John S Biggins. Curvature-driven instabilities in thin active shells. Royal Society Open Science, 2022. (21 pages)

  2. Leone Costi, Josephine Hughes, John Biggins, and Fumiya Iida. Bioin- spired soft bendable peristaltic pump exploiting ballooning for high vol- ume throughput. IEEE Transactions on Medical Robotics and Bionics, 4(3):570–577, 2022. (8 pages)

  3. Elizabeth R Hopper, Christina Boukouvala, J´er´emie Asselin, John S Big- gins, and Emilie Ringe. Opportunities and challenges for alternative nanoplasmonic metals: Magnesium and beyond. The Journal of Physi- cal Chemistry C, 126(26):10630–10643, 2022. (14 pages)

  4. Fan Feng, Daniel Duffy, Mark Warner, and John S Biggins. Interfacial metric mechanics: stitching patterns of shape change in active sheets. Pro- ceedings of the Royal Society A, 478(2262):20220230, 2022. (19 pages)

  5. Christina Boukouvala, Elizabeth R Hopper, Dawn M Kelly, Philippa J Knight, John S Biggins, and Emilie Ringe. Beyond simple crystal systems: Identifying twinning in body-centered tetragonal nanoparticles. Crystal Growth & Design, 22(1):653–660, 2021. (8 pages + 3 pages SI)

  6. Daniel Duffy, M Javed, MK Abdelrahman, TH Ware, Mark Warner, and JS Biggins. Metric mechanics with nontrivial topology: Actuating irises, cylinders, and evertors. Physical Review E, 104(6):065004, 2021. (8 pages)

  7. Daniel Duffy, L Cmok, JS Biggins, A Krishna, Carl D Modes, MK Ab- delrahman, M Javed, TH Ware, F Feng, and M Warner. Shape program- ming lines of concentrated gaussian curvature. Journal of Applied Physics, 129(22):224701, 2021. (13 pages)

  8. Andrea Giudici and John S Biggins. Large deformation analysis of spon- taneous twist and contraction in nematic elastomer fibers with helical director. Journal of Applied Physics, 129(15):154701, 2021. (12 pages)

  9. Elizabeth R Hopper, Christina Boukouvala, Duncan N Johnstone, John S Biggins, and Emilie Ringe. On the identification of twinning in body- centred cubic nanoparticles. Nanoscale, 12(43):22009–22013, 2020. (5 pages + 6 pages SI)

  10. Andrea Giudici and John S Biggins. Giant deformations and soft-inflation in lce balloons. Europhysics Letters, 132(3):36001, 2020

  11. Daniel Duffy and John S Biggins. Defective nematogenesis: Gauss cur- vature in programmable shape-responsive sheets with topological defects. Soft Matter, 16(48):10935–10945, 2020



  12. Fan Feng, John S Biggins, and Mark Warner. Evolving, complex topog- raphy from combining centers of gaussian curvature. Physical Review E, 102(1):013003, 2020

  13. Andrea Giudici and John S Biggins. Ballooning, bulging, and necking: An exact solution for longitudinal phase separation in elastic systems near a critical point. Physical Review E, 102(3):033007, 2020

  14. Jrmie Asselin, Christina Boukouvala, Elizabeth R Hopper, Quentin M Ramasse, John S Biggins, and Emilie Ringe. Tents, chairs, tacos, kites, and rods: Shapes and plasmonic properties of singly twinned magnesium nanoparticles. ACS nano, 14(5):5968–5980, 2020

  15. J´er´emie Asselin, Christina Boukouvala, Yuchen Wu, Elizabeth R Hopper, Sean M Collins, John S Biggins, and Emilie Ringe. Decoration of plas- monic mg nanoparticles by partial galvanic replacement. The Journal of Chemical Physics, 151(24):244708, 2019

  16. Nontawit Cheewaruangroj and John S Biggins. Pattern selection when a layer buckles on a soft substrate. Soft Matter, 15(18):3751–3770, 2019

  17. John S Biggins, Sadegh Yazdi, and Emilie Ringe. Magnesium nanoparticle plasmonics. Nano Letters, 18(6):3752–3758, 2018

  18. Karolis Leonavicius, Christophe Royer, Chris Preece, Benjamin Davies, John S Biggins, and Shankar Srinivas. Mechanics of mouse blastocyst hatching revealed by a hydrogel-based microdeformation assay. Proceed- ings of the National Academy of Sciences, 115(41):10375–10380, 2018

  19. Nontawit Cheewaruangroj, Karolis Leonavicius, Shankar Srinivas, and John S Biggins. Peristaltic elastic instability in an inflated cylindrical channel. Physical review letters, 122(6):068003, 2019

  20. John S Biggins and L Mahadevan. Meniscus instabilities in thin elastic layers. Soft matter, 14(37):7680–7689, 2018

  21. Ding Wang, Nontawit Cheewaruangroj, Yifan Li, Glen McHale, Yinzhu Jiang, David Wood, John Simeon Biggins, and Ben Bin Xu. Spatially configuring wrinkle pattern and multiscale surface evolution with struc- tural confinement. Advanced Functional Materials, 28(1):1704228, 2018

  22. Chen Xuan and John Biggins. Plateau-rayleigh instability in solids is a simple phase separation. Physical Review E, 95(5):053106, 2017

  23. Taylor H Ware, John S Biggins, Andreas F Shick, Mark Warner, and Timothy J White. Localized soft elasticity in liquid crystal elastomers. Nature communications, 7(1):1–7, 2016

  24. Chen Xuan and John Biggins. Finite-wavelength surface-tension-driven instabilities in soft solids, including instability in a cylindrical channel through an elastic solid. Physical Review E, 94(2):023107, 2016



  25. John S Biggins, Christophe Royer, Tomoko Watanabe, and Shankar Srini- vas. Towards understanding the roles of position and geometry on cell fate decisions during preimplantation development. In Seminars in Cell & Developmental Biology, volume 47, pages 74–79. Academic Press, 2015

  26. Tuomas Tallinen and John S Biggins. Mechanics of invagination and fold- ing: Hybridized instabilities when one soft tissue grows on another. Phys- ical Review E, 92(2):022720, 2015

  27. John S Biggins, Z Wei, and L Mahadevan. Fluid-driven fingering instabil- ity of a confined elastic meniscus. EPL (Europhysics Letters), 110(3):34001, 2015

  28. Tomoko Watanabe, John S Biggins, Neeta Bala Tannan, and Shankar Srinivas. Limited predictive value of blastomere angle of division in tro- phectoderm and inner cell mass specification. Development, 141(11):2279– 2288, 2014

  29. Tuomas Tallinen, Jun Young Chung, John S Biggins, and L Mahadevan. Gyrification from constrained cortical expansion. Proceedings of the Na- tional Academy of Sciences, 111(35):12667–12672, 2014

  30. John S Biggins, Z Wei, and L Mahadevan. Exactly isochoric deformations of soft solids. EPL (Europhysics Letters), 108(6):64001, 2014

  31. John S Biggins. Growth and shape of a chain fountain. EPL (Europhysics Letters), 106(4):44001, 2014

  32. John S Biggins and Mark Warner. Understanding the chain fountain. Pro- ceedings of the Royal Society A: Mathematical, Physical and Engineering Sciences, 470(2163):20130689, 2014

  33. John S Biggins, Baudouin Saintyves, Zhiyan Wei, Elisabeth Bouchaud, and Lakshminarayanan Mahadevan. Digital instability of a confined elastic meniscus. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 110(31):12545– 12548, 2013

  34. Tuomas Tallinen, John S Biggins, and L Mahadevan. Surface sulci in squeezed soft solids. Physical review letters, 110(2):024302, 2013

  35. JS Biggins, M Warner, and K Bhattacharya. Elasticity of polydomain liquid crystal elastomers. Journal of the Mechanics and Physics of Solids, 60(4):573–590, 2012

  36. YY Huang, J Biggins, Y Ji, and EM Terentjev. Mechanical bistability in liquid crystal elastomer-wire composite actuators. Journal of Applied Physics, 107(8):083515, 2010

  37. J. S. Biggins. Textured deformations in liquid crystal elastomers. Liquid Crystals, 36(10-11):1139–1156, 2009



  38. J. S. Biggins, M. Warner, and K. Bhattacharya. Supersoft elasticity in polydomain nematic elastomers. Phys. Rev. Lett., 103:037802, Jul 2009

  39. J. S. Biggins and K. Bhattacharya. Characterization of soft stripe-domain deformations in SmC and SmC* liquid-crystal elastomers. Phys. Rev. E, 79:061705, Jun 2009

  40. JS Biggins. Strain-induced polarization in non-ideal chiral nematic elas- tomers. Proceedings of the Royal Society A: Mathematical, Physical and Engineering Sciences, 465(2105):1361–1376, 2009

  41. J. S. Biggins, E. M. Terentjev, and M. Warner. Semisoft elastic response of nematic elastomers to complex deformations. Phys. Rev. E, 78:041704, Oct 2008

PhD Thesis

You can download my PhD thesis here.