Related papers: Multi-agent Modeling and Optimal Pumping Control o…

We combine technical, experimental and theoretical efforts to investigate the collective dynamics of artificial microcilia in a viscous fluid. We take advantage of soft-lithography and colloidal self-assembly to devise microcapets made of…

Fine manipulation of fluid flows at the microscale has a tremendous impact on mass transport phenomena of chemical and biological processes inside microfluidic platforms. Fluid mixing in the laminar flow regime at low Reynolds is poorly…

Skateboarders perform a reciprocating motion on a curved ramp, called pumping, by moving their bodies up and down perpendicular to the ramp's surface. We propose a simple mechanical model for this pumping motion and solve the equation of…

We have developed a simulation model to study the hydrodynamic flow fields around Brownian colloidal particles with an active surface patch. Hydrodynamics is introduced by modeling low-Reynolds-number fluid flows around a colloid using…

Using a two-fluid model for viscoelastic polymer solutions, we study analytically fluid transport driven by a transverse, small amplitude traveling wave propagation. The pumping flow far from the waving boundary is shown to be strongly wave…

Biological molecular machines convert free energy between different forms in cells, often at high efficiency. Optimal control theory provides a framework to elucidate design principles governing energetically efficient driving. Here, we use…

Routing strategies for traffics and vehicles have been historically studied. However, in the absence of considering drivers' preferences, current route planning algorithms are developed under ideal situations where all drivers are expected…

Molecular motors are essential to the living, they generate additional fluctuations that boost transport and assist assembly. Self-propelled colloids, that consume energy to move, hold similar potential for the man-made assembly of…

Underactuated manipulators reduce the number of bulky motors, thereby enabling compact and mechanically robust designs. However, fewer actuators than joints means that the manipulator can only access a specific manifold within the joint…

The ability to robustly and efficiently control the dynamics of nonlinear systems lies at the heart of many current technological challenges, ranging from drug delivery systems to ensuring flight safety. Most such scenarios are too complex…

The manipulation of a collection of fluid particles in a low Reynolds number environment has several important applications. As we demonstrate in this paper, this manipulation problem is related to the scientific question of how fluid flow…

Many biological microswimmers locomote by periodically beating the densely-packed cilia on their cell surface in a wave-like fashion. While the swimming mechanisms of ciliated microswimmers have been extensively studied both from the…

Fishes, cetaceans, and many other aquatic vertebrates undulate their bodies to propel themselves through water. Swimming requires an intricate interplay between sensing the environment, making decisions, controlling internal dynamics, and…

Micro-scale swimming robots have been envisaged for many medical applications such as targeted drug delivery, where the microrobot will be expected to navigate in a fluid through channels carrying a payload. Alternatively, in many cases,…

The design of control systems for the spatial self-organization of mobile agents is an open challenge across several engineering domains, including swarm robotics and synthetic biology. Here, we propose a bio-inspired leader-follower…

Flux of rigid or soft particles (such as drops, vesicles, red blood cells, etc.) in a channel is a complex function of particle concentration, which depends on the details of induced dissipation and suspension structure due to hydrodynamic…

The aim of various technical applications (for example fusion research) is to control a plasma by magnetic fields in a desired fashion. In our model the plasma is described by the Vlasov-Poisson system that is equipped with an external…

In this paper, we introduce an optimal control problem for multi-agent systems with non-local cost which favors simultaneous aggregation of particles. This is done introducing a time-dependent notion of multiplicity whose intrinsic…

Computational fluid dynamics (CFD) has been the main workhorse of computational physics. Yet its steep learning curve and fragmented, multi-stage workflow create significant barriers. To address these challenges, we present Foam-Agent, a…

Biological systems achieve precise control over ambient fluids through the self-organization of active protein structures including flagella, cilia, and cytoskeletal networks. In active structures individual proteins consume chemical energy…