  Inspired by observations of beads packed on a thin string in such systems as
sea-grapes and dental plaque, we study the random sequential adsorption of
spheres on a cylinder. We determine the asymptotic fractional coverage of the
cylinder as a function of the sole parameter in the problem, the ratio of the
sphere radius to the cylinder radius (for a very long cylinder) using a
combination of analysis and numerical simulations. Examining the asymptotic
structures, we find weak chiral ordering on sufficiently small spatial scales.
Experiments involving colloidal microspheres that can attach irreversibly to a
silica wire via electrostatic forces or DNA hybridization allow us to verify
our predictions for the asymptotic coverage.
