Metastability of Discrete-Symmetry Flocks
Soft Condensed Matter
2023-12-19 v1 Statistical Mechanics
Abstract
We study the stability of the ordered phase of flocking models with a scalar order parameter. Using both the active Ising model and a hydrodynamic description, we show that droplets of particles moving in the direction opposite to that of the ordered phase nucleate and grow. We characterize analytically this self-similar growth and demonstrate that droplets spread ballistically in all directions. Our results imply that, in the thermodynamic limit, discrete-symmetry flocks -- and, by extension, continuous-symmetry flocks with rotational anisotropy -- are metastable in all dimensions.
Keywords
Cite
@article{arxiv.2306.01156,
title = {Metastability of Discrete-Symmetry Flocks},
author = {Brieuc Benvegnen and Omer Granek and Sunghan Ro and Ran Yaacoby and Hugues Chaté and Yariv Kafri and David Mukamel and Alexandre Solon and Julien Tailleur},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2306.01156},
year = {2023}
}