2021/09/30 by Matteo Paoluzzi, Paoluzzi, Matteo, Demian Levis +3 · 4 citations
Materials Science · Physics and Astronomy · #FOS: Physical sciences #Material Dynamics and Properties #Micro and Nano Robotics #Pickering emulsions and particle stabilization #Soft Condensed Matter (cond-mat.soft) #Statistical Mechanics (cond-mat.stat-mech)
paper · pdf · doi:10.48550/arxiv.2109.14948
openalex publication_date 2021/09/30 · openalex created_date 2022/07/25 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/28
Dense active systems are widespread in nature, examples range from bacterial colonies to biological tissues. Dense clusters of active particles can be obtained by increasing the packing fraction of the system or taking advantage of a peculiar phenomenon named motility-induced phase separation (MIPS). In this work, we explore the phase diagram of a two-dimensional model of active glass and show that disordered active materials develop a rich collective behaviour encompassing both MIPS and glassiness. We find that, although the glassy state is almost indistinguishable from that of equilibrium glasses, the mechanisms leading to its fluidization do not have any equilibrium counterpart. Our results can be rationalized in terms of a crossover between a low-activity regime, where glassy dynamics is controlled by an effective temperature, and a high-activity regime, which drives the system towards MIPS.