J (Justin) Tauber, PhD

I am Justin Tauber, a Postdoctoral Researcher in the Physical Chemistry and Soft Matter group at Wageningen University. I investigate how soft materials—such as rubber, particle suspensions, and living tissues—deform, break, or flow when they are disturbed. Under the right conditions, these responses can lead to intricate patterns and shapes. Using computational models, I explore how such shapes emerge from the unique physics of soft matter, which underpins many physical and biological processes. Although I occasionally step into the lab myself, most of my work is carried out in close collaboration with experimentalists.

As part of the GreenTE consortium, I develop models to help explain how plants sense and respond to mechanical forces. Previously, I worked on the elasticity and fracture of (bio)polymer networks during my PhD with Simone Dussi and Prof. Jasper van der Gucht at Wageningen University, and on branching morphogenesis in soft and living matter as an EMBO Postdoctoral Fellow in the Soft Math Lab of Prof. L. Mahadevan at Harvard University.