Related papers: Confinement-driven state transition and bistabilit…
Packing and crowding are used in biology as mechanisms to (self-)regulate internal molecular or cellular processes based on collective signalling. Here, we study how the transition kinetics of an internal switch of responsive macromolecules…
A granular system confined in a quasi two-dimensional box that is vertically vibrated can transit to an absorbing state in which all particles bounce vertically in phase with the box, with no horizontal motion. In principle, this state can…
Inside cells, cargos such as vesicles and organelles are transported by molecular motors to their correct locations via active motion on cytoskeletal tracks and passive, Brownian diffusion. During the transportation of cargos, motor-cargo…
It is generally accepted that, when moving in groups, animals process information to coordinate their motion. Recent studies have begun to apply rigorous methods based on Information Theory to quantify such distributed computation.…
We study the orientational order of an immobile fish school. Starting from the second Newton's law, we show that the inertial dynamics of orientations is ruled by an Ornstein-Uhlenbeck process. This process describes the dynamics of…
We study long-range interacting systems driven by external stochastic forces that act collectively on all the particles constituting the system. Such a scenario is frequently encountered in the context of plasmas, self-gravitating systems,…
We investigate theoretically the collective dynamics of a suspension of low Reynolds number swimmers that are confined to two dimensions by a thin fluid film. Our model swimmer is characterized by internal degrees of freedom which locally…
The formation of (bio)molecular condensates via liquid-liquid phase separation in cells has received increasing attention, as these coacervates play important functional and regulatory roles within biological systems. However, the majority…
Animals employ different strategies for relating sensory input to behavioral output to navigate sensory environments, but what strategy to use, when to switch and why remain unclear. In C. elegans, navigation is composed of 'steering' and…
Understanding the out-of-equilibrium properties of noisy microscale systems and the extent to which they can be modulated externally, is a crucial scientific and technological challenge. It holds the promise to unlock disruptive new…
Integrable systems possess stable families of quasiparticles, which are composite objects (bound states) of elementary excitations. Motivated by recent quantum computer experiments, we investigate bound-state transport in the spin-$1/2$…
Recent developments in automated tracking allow uninterrupted, high-resolution recording of animal trajectories, sometimes coupled with the identification of stereotyped changes of body pose or other behaviors of interest. Analysis and…
In active matter systems, self-propelled particles can self-organize to undergo collective motion, leading to persistent dynamical behavior out of equilibrium. In cells, cytoskeletal filaments and motor proteins self-organize into complex…
The acoustic properties of a fish school have been modelled using a cloud of bubbles. Similar to how bubble clouds present a collective monopole mode, a fish school also shows a collective breathing mode in which the whole school resonates…
We develop simple diffusion-advection models to estimate the average time it takes fish to reach one of the boundaries of an enclosure and the population distribution over time moving in the enclosure (such as a lake or slough). We start…
Driven particle transport in crowded and confining environments is fundamental to diverse phenomena across physics, chemistry, and biology. A main objective in studying such systems is to identify novel emergent states and phases of…
Dense suspensions of swimming bacteria are known to exhibit collective behaviour arising from the interplay of steric and hydrodynamic interactions. Unconfined suspensions exhibit transient, recurring vortices and jets, whereas those…
Aligning self-propelled particles undergo a nonequilibrium flocking transition from apolar to polar phases as their interactions become stronger. We propose a thermodynamically consistent lattice model, in which the internal state of the…
There are rich emergent phase behaviors in non-equilibrium active systems. Flocking and clustering are two representative dynamic phases. The relationship between these two phases is still unclear. In the paper, we numerically investigate…
We experimentally investigate the statistical behaviour of a model two-dimensional granular system undergoing stationary sedimentation. Buoyant cylindrical particles are rotated in liquid-filled drum, thus confined in a harmonic centripetal…