2014/09/17 by Xue Ao, Pulak Kumar Ghosh, Yunyun Li +3 · 2 citations
Physics and Astronomy · #cond-mat.soft
paper · pdf · doi:10.1140/epjst/e2014-02329-1
published as Eur. Phys. J. Special Topics 223, 3227 (2014) · to be published in Eur. Phys. J Special Topics
arxiv created 2014/09/17 · arxiv updated 2014/12/19
We review recent advances in rectification control of artificial microswimmers, also known as Janus particles, diffusing along narrow, periodically corrugated channels. The swimmer self-propulsion mechanism is modeled so as to incorporate a nonzero torque (propulsion chirality). We first summarize the effects of chirality on the autonomous current of microswimmers freely diffusing in channels of different geometries. In particular, left-right and upside-down asymmetric channels are shown to exhibit different transport properties. We then report new results on the dependence of the diffusivity of chiral microswimmers on the channel geometry and their own self-propulsion mechanism. The self-propulsion torque turns out to play a key role as a transport control parameter.