%0 Journal Article %T Wrinkling of a bilayer membrane %A A. Concha %A J. W. McIver III %A P. Mellado %A D. Clarke %A O. Tchernyshyov %A R. L. Leheny %J Physics %D 2006 %I arXiv %R 10.1103/PhysRevE.75.016609 %X The buckling of elastic bodies is a common phenomenon in the mechanics of solids. Wrinkling of membranes can often be interpreted as buckling under constraints that prohibit large amplitude deformation. We present a combination of analytic calculations, experiments, and simulations to understand wrinkling patterns generated in a bilayer membrane. The model membrane is composed of a flexible spherical shell that is under tension and that is circumscribed by a stiff, essentially incompressible strip with bending modulus B. When the tension is reduced sufficiently to a value \sigma, the strip forms wrinkles with a uniform wavelength found theoretically and experimentally to be \lambda = 2\pi(B/\sigma)^{1/3}. Defects in this pattern appear for rapid changes in tension. Comparison between experiment and simulation further shows that, with larger reduction of tension, a second generation of wrinkles with longer wavelength appears only when B is sufficiently small. %U http://arxiv.org/abs/cond-mat/0611507v1