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Active Brownian particles, even without attractive and anisotropic inter-particle interactions, can form a high-density phase featuring structure-ordered domains as well as collective motion regions under thermal noise. However, the…

We consider collective dynamics of self-propelling particles in two dimensions. They can align themselves according to the direction of propulsion of their neighbours, together with a random perturbation (i.e. rotational fluctuation). They…

We numerically examine the dynamics of a probe particle driven at a constant force through an assembly of particles with competing long-range repulsion and short-range attraction that forms a bubble or stripe state. In the bubble regime, we…

Via mechanisms not accessible at equilibrium, self-propelled particles can form phases with positional order, such as crystals, and with orientational order, such as polar flocks. However, the interplay between these two types of order…

We study experimentally the origin of heterogeneous dynamics in strongly driven glass-forming systems. Thereto, we apply a well-defined force with a laser line trap on individual colloidal polystyrene probe particles seeded in an emulsion…

Particles with directional interactions are promising building blocks for new functional materials and may serve as models for biological structures. Mutually attractive nanoparticles that are deformable due to flexible surface groups, for…

The cellular environment, characterized by its intricate composition and spatial organization, hosts a variety of organelles, ranging from membrane-bound ones to membraneless structures that are formed through liquid-liquid phase…

In the field of microdroplet manipulation, optical tweezers have been used to form and grow droplets, to transport them, or to measure forces between droplet pairs. However, the exploration of out-of-equilibrium phenomena in optically…

Optomechanical pattern forming instabilities in a cloud of cold atoms lead to self-organized spatial structures of light and atoms. Here, we consider the optomechanical self-structuring of a cold atomic cloud in the presence of a phase…

An active colloidal fluid comprised of self-propelled spinning particles injecting energy and angular momentum at the microscale demonstrates spontaneous collective states that range from flocks to coherent vortices. Despite their seeming…

Vitrimers offer a promising sustainable alternative to conventional epoxies due to their recyclability. Vitrimers are covalent adaptive networks where some bonds can break and reform above the vitrimer transition temperature. While this can…

We report optical trapping and transport of nanoparticles in a moving interference pattern in hollow-core photonic crystal fiber at atmospheric pressure, when competition between trapping and drag forces causes the particle velocity to…

We investigate both theoretically and experimentally the rotational dynamics of micrometric droplets of dye-doped and pure liquid crystal induced by circularly and elliptically polarized laser light. The droplets are dispersed in water and…

The dynamics of colloidal particles in potential energy landscapes have mainly been investigated theoretically. In contrast, here we discuss the experimental realization of potential energy landscapes with the help of light fields and the…

Spin coating is an out-of-equilibrium technique for producing polymer films and colloidal crystals quickly and reproducibly. In this review, we present an overview of theoretical and experimental studies of the spin coating of colloidal…

Driven particles in presence of crowded environment, obstacles or kinetic constraints often exhibit negative differential mobility (NDM) due to their decreased dynamical activity. We propose a new mechanism for complex many-particle systems…

The internal dynamics of active gels, both in artificial (in-vitro) model systems and inside the cytoskeleton of living cells, has been extensively studied by experiments of recent years. These dynamics are probed using tracer particles…

Globular clusters are among the most congested stellar systems in the Universe. Internal dynamical evolution drives them toward states of high central density, while simultaneously concentrating the most massive stars and binary systems in…

Colloidal probes immersed in an active bath have been found to behave like active particles themselves. Here, we use coarse-grained simulations to investigate the mechanisms behind this behavior. We find that the active motion of the…

Understanding and exploiting the dynamics of complex nonlinear systems is nowadays at the core of a broad range of scientific and technological endeavors. Within the optical domain, light evolution in a nonlinear multimode environment…