No Arabic abstract
We study the collective dynamics of groups of whirligig beetles Dineutus discolor (Coleoptera: Gyrinidae) swimming freely on the surface of water. We extract individual trajectories for each beetle, including positions and orientations, and use this to discover (i) a density dependent speed scaling like $vsimrho^{- u}$ with $ uapprox0.4$ over two orders of magnitude in density (ii) an inertial delay for velocity alignment of $sim 13$ ms and (iii) coexisting high and low density phases, consistent with motility induced phase separation (MIPS). We modify a standard active brownian particle (ABP) model to a Corralled ABP (CABP) model that functions in open space by incorporating a density-dependent reorientation of the beetles, towards the cluster. We use our new model to test our hypothesis that a MIPS (or a MIPS like effect) can explain the co-occurrence of high and low density phases we see in our data. The fitted model then successfully recovers a MIPS-like condensed phase for $N=200$ and the absence of such a phase for smaller group sizes $N=50,100$.
Using Brownian Dynamics simulations, we study effective interactions mediated between two identical and impermeable disks (inclusions) immersed in a bath of identical, active (self-propelled), Brownian rods in two spatial dimensions, by assuming that the self-propulsion axis of the rods may generally deviate from their longitudinal axis. When the self-propulsion is transverse (perpendicular to the rod axis), the accumulation of active rods around the inclusions is significantly enhanced, causing a more expansive steric layering (ring formation) of the rods around the inclusions, as compared with the reference case of longitudinally self-propelling rods. As a result, the transversally self-propelling rods also mediate a significantly longer ranged effective interaction between the inclusions. The bath-mediated interaction arises due to the overlaps between the active-rod rings formed around the inclusions, as they are brought into small separations. When the self-propulsion axis is tilted relative to the rod axis, we find an asymmetric imbalance of active-rod accumulation around the inclusion dimer. This leads to a noncentral interaction, featuring an anti-parallel pair of transverse force components and, hence, a bath-mediated torque on the dimer.
Active Brownian particles (ABPs) and Run-and-Tumble particles (RTPs) both self-propel at fixed speed $v$ along a body-axis ${bf u}$ that reorients either through slow angular diffusion (ABPs) or sudden complete randomisation (RTPs). We compare the physics of these two model systems both at microscopic and macroscopic scales. Using exact results for their steady-state distribution in the presence of external potentials, we show that they both admit the same effective equilibrium regime perturbatively that breaks down for stronger external potentials, in a model-dependent way. In the presence of collisional repulsions such particles slow down at high density: their propulsive effort is unchanged, but their average speed along ${bf u}$ becomes $v(rho) < v$. A fruitful avenue is then to construct a mean-field description in which particles are ghost-like and have no collisions, but swim at a variable speed $v$ that is an explicit function or functional of the density $rho$. We give numerical evidence that the recently shown equivalence of the fluctuating hydrodynamics of ABPs and RTPs in this case, which we detail here, extends to microscopic models of ABPs and RTPs interacting with repulsive forces.
Using Brownian dynamics simulations, the motion of active Brownian particles (ABPs) in the presence of fuel (or food) sources is studied. It is an established fact that within confined stationary systems, the activity of ABPs generates density profiles that are enhanced in regions of low activity, which is generally referred to as anti-chemotaxis. We demonstrate that -- contrary to common believes -- in non-stationary setups, emerging here as a result of short fuel bursts, our model ABPs do instead exhibit signatures of chemotactic behavior. In direct competition with inactive, but otherwise identical Brownian particles (BPs), the ABPs are shown to fetch a larger amount of food. From a biological perspective, the ability to turn active would, despite of the absence of sensoric devices, encompass an evolutionary advantage.
Active particles may happen to be confined in channels so narrow that they cannot overtake each other (Single File conditions). This interesting situation reveals nontrivial physical features as a consequence of the strong inter-particle correlations developed in collective rearrangements. We consider a minimal model for active Brownian particles with the aim of studying the modifications introduced by activity with respect to the classical (passive) Single File picture. Depending on whether their motion is dominated by translational or rotational diffusion, we find that active Brownian particles in Single File may arrange into clusters which are continuously merging and splitting ({it active clusters}) or merely reproduce passive-motion paradigms, respectively. We show that activity convey to self-propelled particles a strategic advantage for trespassing narrow channels against external biases (e.g., the gravitational field).
The equilibrium properties of a system of passive diffusing particles in an external magnetic field are unaffected by the Lorentz force. In contrast, active Brownian particles exhibit steady-state phenomena that depend on both the strength and the polarity of the applied magnetic field. The intriguing effects of the Lorentz force, however, can only be observed when out-of-equilibrium density gradients are maintained in the system. To this end, we use the method of stochastic resetting on active Brownian particles in two dimensions by resetting them to the line $x=0$ at a constant rate and periodicity in the $y$ direction. Under stochastic resetting, an active system settles into a nontrivial stationary state which is characterized by an inhomogeneous density distribution, polarization and bulk fluxes perpendicular to the density gradients. We show that whereas for a uniform magnetic field the properties of the stationary state of the active system can be obtained from its passive counterpart, novel features emerge in the case of an inhomogeneous magnetic field which have no counterpart in passive systems. In particular, there exists an activity-dependent threshold rate such that for smaller resetting rates, the density distribution of active particles becomes non-monotonic. We also study the mean first-passage time to the $x$ axis and find a surprising result: it takes an active particle more time to reach the target from any given point for the case when the magnetic field increases away from the axis. The theoretical predictions are validated using Brownian dynamics simulations.