2013/04/26 by Nick Koumakis, Roberto Di Leonardo
Engineering · Physics and Astronomy · #Classical mechanics #Computer science #Energy (signal processing) #Holography #Mechanics #Mesoscopic physics #Micro and Nano Robotics #Microfluidic and Bio-sensing Technologies #Optical tweezers #Optics #Orbital Angular Momentum in Optics #Physics #Quantum mechanics #Statistical physics #Synchronization (alternating current) #cond-mat.soft
paper · pdf · doi:10.1103/physrevlett.110.174103
published as Phys. Rev. Lett. 110, 174103 (2013) · Copyright (2013) by the American Physical Society
openalex publication_date 2013/04/26 · arxiv created 2014/01/28 · arxiv updated 2014/01/29 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/05
Hydrodynamic synchronization provides a general mechanism for the spontaneous emergence of coherent beating states in independently driven mesoscopic oscillators. A complete physical picture of those phenomena is of definite importance to the understanding of biological cooperative motions of cilia and flagella. Moreover, it can potentially suggest novel routes to exploit synchronization in technological applications of soft matter. We demonstrate that driving colloidal particles in rotating energy landscapes results in a strong tendency towards synchronization, favoring states where all beads rotate in phase. The resulting dynamics can be described in terms of activated jumps with transition rates that are strongly affected by hydrodynamics leading to an increased probability and lifetime of the synchronous states. Using holographic optical tweezers we quantitatively verify our predictions in a variety of spatial configurations of rotors.