Related papers: Guiding microscale swimmers using teardrop-shaped …
Small objects can swim by generating around them fields or gradients which in turn induce fluid motion past their surface by phoretic surface effects. We quantify for arbitrary swimmer shapes and surface patterns, how efficient swimming…
Active droplets are artificial microswimmers built from a liquid dispersion by microfluidic tools and showing self-propelled motion. These systems hold particular interest for mimicking biological phenomena, such as some aspects of cell…
It has been shown that an anisotropic liquid crystalline (LC) environment can be used to guide the self-propulsion dynamics of dispersed microswimmers, such as bacteria. This type of composite system is named "living nematic" (LN). In the…
Nanofluidics, the field interested in flows at the smallest scales, has grown at a fast pace, reaching an ever finer control offluidic and ionic transport at the molecular level. Still, artificial pores are far from reaching the wealth of…
Finding the fastest path to a desired destination is a vitally important task for microorganisms moving in a fluid flow. We study this problem by building an analytical formalism for overdamped microswimmers on curved manifolds and…
Nanofluidics is pivotal in fundamental research and diverse applications, from water desalination to energy harvesting and biological analysis. Dynamically manipulating nanofluidic properties, such as diffusion and friction, presents an…
In the field of biomedicine magnetic beads are used for drug delivery and to treat hyperthermia. Here we propose to use self-organized bead structures to isolate circulating tumor cells using lab-on-chip technologies. Typically blood flows…
The ordering of nanoparticles into predetermined configurations is of importance to the design of advanced technologies. In this work, we moderate the surface anchoring against the bulk elasticity of liquid crystals to dynamically shape…
For natural microswimmers, the interplay of swimming activity and external flow can promote robust motion, e.g. propulsion against ("upstream rheotaxis") or perpendicular to the direction of flow. These effects are generally attributed to…
Nanodroplets residing near wedges or edges of solid substrates exhibit a disjoining pressure induced dynamics. Our nanoscale hydrodynamic calculations reveal that non-volatile droplets are attracted or repelled from edges or wedges…
Recently, it was found that a wedgelike microparticle (referred to as "carrier") which is only allowed to translate but not to rotate exhibits a directed translational motion along the wedge cusp if it is exposed to a bath of microswimmers.…
We study the fluid dynamics of two fish-like bodies with synchronised swimming patterns. Our studies are based on two-dimensional simulations of viscous incompressible flows. We distinguish between motion patterns that are externally…
We theoretically describe the dynamics of swimmer populations confined in thin liquid films. We first demonstrate that hydrodynamic interactions between confined swimmers only depend on their shape and are independent of their specific…
Transport phenomena of microswimmers in fluid flows play a crucial role in various biological processes, including bioconvection and cell sorting. In this paper, we investigate the dispersion behavior of chiral microswimmers in a simple…
Selective heating of a microparticle surface had been observed to cause its autonomous movement in a fluid medium due to self-generated temperature gradients. In this work, we theoretically investigate the response of such an…
Aquatic creatures exhibit remarkable adaptations of their body to efficiently interact with the surrounding fluid. The tight coupling between their morphology, motion, and the environment are highly complex but serves as a valuable example…
Multi-flagellated bacteria utilize the hydrodynamic interaction between their filamentary tails, known as flagella, to swim and change their swimming direction in low Reynolds number flow. This interaction, referred to as bundling and…
Motile bacteria are a wonder of nature's engineering: microscopic engines that transduce biochemical energy into the work they require to explore their environment. This added energy turns the surrounding fluid into a bath that departs from…
Recent research has shown that motile cells can adapt their mode of propulsion depending on the environment in which they find themselves. One mode is swimming by blebbing or other shape changes, and in this paper we analyze a class of…
Geometric confinements are frequently encountered in soft matter systems and in particular significantly alter the dynamics of swimming microorganisms in viscous media. Surface-related effects on the motility of microswimmers can lead to…