Multi-scale microrheology using fluctuating filaments as stealth probes

Abstract

The mechanical properties of soft materials can be probed on small length scales by various microrheology methods. A common approach tracks fluctuations of micrometer-sized beads embedded in the medium to be characterized. This approach yields results that depend on the probe size when the medium has structure on length scales comparable to or larger than this size. Here, we introduce a filament-based microrheology (FMR) method using high-aspect-ratio semi-flexible filaments as probes. Such quasi-1D probes are much less invasive due to the nanometer-scale cross section of the probes. Moreover, by imaging the transverse bending modes, we are able to simultaneously determine the micromechanical response of the medium on multiple length scales corresponding bending wavelengths. Here, we use single-walled carbon nanotubes (SWNT) as probes that can be accurately and rapidly imaged based on their stable fluorescence. We model SWNTs as semi-flexible filaments. We find that the viscoelastic properties of sucrose and polymeric hyaluronic acid solutions measured in this way are in good agreement with those measured by conventional micro- and macrorheology.