2018/11/22 by Koumakis, Nick, Brown, Aidan T., Arlt, Jochen +3
#FOS: Physical sciences #Soft Condensed Matter (cond-mat.soft)
paper · doi:10.48550/arxiv.1811.09133
We use moving light patterns to control the motion of \it Escherichia coli bacteria whose motility is photo-activated. Varying the pattern speed controls the magnitude and direction of the bacterial flux, and therefore the accumulation of cells in up- and down-stream reservoirs. We validate our results with two-dimensional simulations and a 1-dimensional analytic model, and use these to explore parameter space. We find that cell accumulation is controlled by a competition between directed flux and undirected, stochastic transport. We articulate design principles for using moving light patterns and light-activated micro-swimmers to achieve particular experimental goals.