Self-Motility of an Active Particle Induced by Correlations in the Surrounding Solution

Current models of phoretic transport rely on molecular forces creating a "diffuse" particle-fluid interface. We investigate theoretically an alternative mechanism, in which a diffuse interface emerges solely due to a nonvanishing correlation length of the surrounding solution. This mechani...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:	Physical review letters Vol. 125; no. 26; p. 268002
Main Authors:	Domínguez, Alvaro, Popescu, M N, Rohwer, C M, Dietrich, S
Format:	Journal Article
Language:	English
Published:	United States American Physical Society 31-12-2020
Subjects:	Correlation Micrometers Motility Phenomenology
Online Access:	Get full text
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Summary:	Current models of phoretic transport rely on molecular forces creating a "diffuse" particle-fluid interface. We investigate theoretically an alternative mechanism, in which a diffuse interface emerges solely due to a nonvanishing correlation length of the surrounding solution. This mechanism can drive self-motility of a chemically active particle. Numerical estimates indicate that the velocity can reach micrometers per second. The predicted phenomenology includes a bilinear dependence of the velocity on the activity and a possible double velocity reversal upon varying the correlation length.
Bibliography:	ObjectType-Article-1 SourceType-Scholarly Journals-1 ObjectType-Feature-2 content type line 23
ISSN:	0031-9007 1079-7114
DOI:	10.1103/PhysRevLett.125.268002