Geometrical guidance and trapping transition of human sperm cells

Superdiffusion in dispersions of active colloids driven by an external field and their sedimentation equilibrium

The diffusive behaviors of active colloids with run-and-tumble movement are explored by dissipative particle dynamics simulations for self-propelled particles (force dipole) and external field-driven particles (point force). The self-diffusion of tracers (solvent) is investigated as well. The influences of the active force, run time, and concentration associated with active particles are studied. For the system of self-propelled particles, the normal diffusion is observed for both active particles and tracers. The diffusivity of the former is significantly greater than that of the latter. For the system of field-driven particles, the superdiffusion is seen for both active particles and tracers. In contrast, it is found that the anomalous diffusion exponent of the former is slightly less than that of the latter. The anomalous diffusion is caused by the many-body, long-range hydrodynamic interactions. In spite of the superdiffusion, the sedimentation equilibrium of field-driven particles can be acquired and the density profile is still exponentially decayed. The sedimentation length of field-driven particles is always greater than that of self-propelled particles.

Self-Assembly of Micromachining Systems Powered by Janus Micromotors

Janus particles can self-assemble around microfabricated gears in reproducible configurations with a high degree of spatial and orientational order. The final configuration maximizes the torque applied on the rotor leading to a unidirectional and steady rotating motion. The interplay between geometry and dynamical behavior leads to the self-assembly of Janus micromotors starting from randomly distributed particles.

Ratchet transport powered by chiral active particles

We numerically investigate the ratchet transport of mixtures of active and passive particles in a transversal asymmetric channel. A big passive particle is immersed in a ‘sea’ of active particles. Due to the chirality of active particles, the longitudinal directed transport is induced by the transversal asymmetry. For the active particles, the chirality completely determines the direction of the ratchet transport, the counterclockwise and clockwise particles move to the opposite directions and can be separated. However, for the passive particle, the transport behavior becomes complicated, the direction is determined by competitions among the chirality, the self-propulsion speed, and the packing fraction. Interestingly, within certain parameters, the passive particle moves to the left, while active particles move to the right. In addition, there exist optimal parameters (the chirality, the height of the barrier, the self-propulsion speed and the packing fraction) at which the rectified efficiency takes its maximal value. Our findings could be used for the experimental pursuit of the ratchet transport powered by chiral active particles.

Enhancing rectification of a nano-swimmer system by multi-layered asymmetric barriers

The rectification of nano-swimmers in two chambers separated by a strip of funnel gates is explored by dissipative particle dynamics simulations. According to the trajectories of active colloids across the funnel zone, two rectification mechanisms are identified: geometry-assisted diffusion and trap-hindered diffusion. In general, geometry-assisted diffusion dominates at a small active force (Fa) and run time (τ) while trap-hindered diffusion governs at a large Fa and τ. The rectification ratio is affected by the funnel shape and various geometries are considered: open/closed triangular, circular and rectangular funnels. The rectification ratio of open funnels is always greater than that of closed funnels. Moreover, the open circular funnel has the best performance while the triangular one has the worst. Rectification can be enhanced as the number of funnel layers is increased. It is found that the rectification ratio of self-propelled colloids can be dramatically augmented by triple-layered funnels to be as high as 30. Our simulation study offers an efficient approach for rectification enhancement.

Disrupting the wall accumulation of human sperm cells by artificial corrugation

Many self-propelled microorganisms are attracted to surfaces. This makes their dynamics in restricted geometries very different from that observed in the bulk. Swimming along walls is beneficial for directing and sorting cells, but may be detrimental if homogeneous populations are desired, such as in counting microchambers. In this work, we characterize the motion of human sperm cells ∼60 μm long, strongly confined to ∼25 μm shallow chambers. We investigate the nature of the cell trajectories between the confining surfaces and their accumulation near the borders. Observed cell trajectories are composed of a succession of quasi-circular and quasi-linear segments. This suggests that the cells follow a path of intermittent trappings near the top and bottom surfaces separated by stretches of quasi-free motion in between the two surfaces, as confirmed by depth resolved confocal microscopy studies. We show that the introduction of artificial petal-shaped corrugation in the lateral boundaries removes the tendency of cells to accumulate near the borders, an effect which we hypothesize may be valuable for microfluidic applications in biomedicine.

Dynamics and density distribution of strongly confined noninteracting nonaligning self-propelled particles in a nonconvex boundary

We study the dynamics of nonaligning, noninteracting self-propelled particles confined to a box in two dimensions. In the strong confinement limit, when the persistence length of the active particles is much larger than the size of the box, particles stay on the boundary and align with the local boundary normal. It is then possible to derive the steady-state density on the boundary for arbitrary box shapes. In nonconvex boxes, the nonuniqueness of the boundary normal results in hysteretic dynamics and the density is nonlocal, i.e., it depends on the global geometry of the box. These findings establish a general connection between the geometry of a confining box and the behavior of an ideal active gas it confines, thus providing a powerful tool to understand and design such confinements.

Chemically powered micro- and nanomotors

Chemically powered micro- and nanomotors are small devices that are self-propelled by catalytic reactions in fluids. Taking inspiration from biomotors, scientists are aiming to find the best architecture for self-propulsion, understand the mechanisms of motion, and develop accurate control over the motion. Remotely guided nanomotors can transport cargo to desired targets, drill into biomaterials, sense their environment, mix or pump fluids, and clean polluted water. This Review summarizes the major advances in the growing field of catalytic nanomotors, which started ten years ago.

Dynamics of self-propelled particles under strong confinement

We develop a statistical theory for the dynamics of non-aligning, non-interacting self-propelled particles confined in a convex box in two dimensions. We find that when the size of the box is small compared to the persistence length of a particle's trajectory (strong confinement), the steady-state density is zero in the bulk and proportional to the local curvature on the boundary. Conversely, the theory may be used to construct the box shape that yields any desired density distribution on the boundary, thus offering a general tool to understand and design such confinements. When the curvature variations are small, we also predict the distribution of orientations at the boundary and the exponential decay of pressure as a function of box size recently observed in simulations in a spherical box.

Casimir effect in swimmer suspensions

We show that the Casimir effect can emerge in microswimmer suspensions. In principle, two effects conspire against the development of Casimir effects in swimmer suspensions. First, at low Reynolds number, the force on any closed volume vanishes, but here the relevant effect is the drag by the flow produced by the swimmers, which can be finite. Second, the fluid velocity and the pressure are linear on the swimmer force dipoles, and averaging over the swimmer orientations would lead to a vanishing effect. However, being that the suspension is a discrete system, the noise terms of the coarse-grained equations depend on the density, which itself fluctuates, resulting in effective nonlinear dynamics. Applying the tools developed for other nonequilibrium systems to general coarse-grained equations for swimmer suspensions, the Casimir drag is computed on immersed objects, and it is found to depend on the correlation function between the rescaled density and dipolar density fields. By introducing a model correlation function with medium-range order, explicit expressions are obtained for the Casimir drag on a body. When the correlation length is much larger than the microscopic cutoff, the average drag is independent of the correlation length, with a range that depends only on the size of the immersed bodies.