title: Toroidal membrane vesicles in spherical confinement.
abstract: We investigate the morphology of a toroidal fluid membrane vesicle confined inside a spherical container. The equilibrium shapes are assembled in a geometrical phase diagram as a function of scaled area and reduced volume of the membrane. For small area the vesicle can adopt its free form. When increasing the area, the membrane cannot avoid contact and touches the confining sphere along a circular contact line, which extends to a zone of contact for higher area. The elastic energies of the equilibrium shapes are compared to those of their confined counterparts of spherical topology to predict under which conditions a topology change is favored energetically.
authors.affiliation: Département de Physique Théorique, Faculté de Physique, USTHB, BP 32 El-Alia Bab-Ezzouar, 16111 Alger, Algeria.
authors.forename: Lila
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Bouzar
authors.affiliation: Laboratoire de Physique et Chimie Quantique, Université Mouloud Mammeri, BP 17, 15000 Tizi-Ouzou, Algeria.|Ecole Nationale Préparatoire aux Etudes d'Ingéniorat, Département de Physique, BP 05 Rouïba, Alger, Algeria.
authors.forename: Ferhat
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Menas
authors.affiliation: Equipe BioPhysStat, LCP-A2MC, Université de Lorraine, 1 boulevard Arago, 57070 Metz, France.|Institut Charles Sadron, CNRS-UdS, 23 rue du Loess, BP 84047, 67034 Strasbourg cedex 2, France.
authors.forename: Martin Michael
authors.initials: MM
authors.lastname: Müller
mesh_terms: D002462:Cell Membrane; D003198:Computer Simulation; D020342:Finite Element Analysis; D008560:Membrane Fluidity; D008567:Membranes, Artificial; D008962:Models, Theoretical; D013696:Temperature
chemical_list: D008567:Membranes, Artificial