Dynamics of vesicles in shear and rotational flows: Modal dynamics and phase diagram

Despite the recent upsurge of theoretical reduced models for vesicle shape dynamics, comparisons with experiments have not been accomplished. We review the implications of some of the recently proposed models for vesicle dynamics, especially the tumbling-trembling domain regions of the phase plane, and show that they all fail to capture the essential behavior of real vesicles for excess areas Delta greater than 0.4. We emphasize new observations of shape harmonics and the role of thermal fluctuations. (C) 2011 American Institute of Physics. [doi:10.1063/1.3556439]