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Structure and Dynamics of Matter

Soft matter is a class of materials that exhibit large, non-linear responses to external stimuli, such as glasses, gels, active matter, and living systems. These responses are usually slow, in a timescale that is comparable to the scale of the stimulus, which prevents soft matter from reaching thermodynamic equilibrium. Understanding the dynamics of soft matter in complex environments, such as near surfaces and interfaces, in disordered environments, and under time-dependent confinement, is a major challenge for both theoretical and experimental physics. We aim to investigate the effects of surface interactions, disorder, and confinement on the structural and dynamical properties of soft matter; explore the emergence of collective phenomena, such as self-assembly, phase transitions, active flows in complex environments; and develop new methods and models that can bridge the gap between the microscopic and macroscopic scales.