Ratchet-induced matter-wave transport and soliton collisions in Bose-Einstein condensates

We study the dynamics of bright matter-wave solitons in a Bose-Einstein condensate with negative scattering length under the influence of a time-periodic ratchet potential. The potential is formed by a one-dimensional bichromatic optical lattice which flashes on and off so that the time average of its amplitude vanishes. Due to the broken space and time-reversal symmetries of the potential, the soliton is transported with a nonzero average velocity. By employing the non-dissipative mean-field model for the matter waves, we study the dependence of the transport velocity on the initial state of the soliton and show how the properties of the individual localized states affect the outcome of their collisions. A useful insight into the transport properties is provided by Hamiltonian theory for the mean field, which treats the extended matter-wave excitation as an effective classical particle.     

Coherent structures in monolayers of swimming particles

We report various types of coherent structures in suspensions of spherical particles swimming in a monolayer. We solve the fluid dynamics precisely from far-field hydrodynamic interactions to lubrication between two near-contact surfaces. The simulation results clearly illustrate that coherent structures, such as aggregation, mesoscale spatiotemporal motion, and band formation, can be generated by purely hydrodynamic interactions.     

Nonequilibrium processes in condensed media. Part 2. Structural instability induced by shock loading

In the first part of the work, we described our concept of shock wave processes, which is based on nonlocal nonequilibrium transport theory, and an associated mathematical elastoplastic wave model that allows for inertial properties, structural changes, and variation in mechanical properties of solid-state materials under shock loading. In the second part of the work, it is demonstrated that the energy exchange between the scales of dynamic deformation is defined by the relation between the characteristics measurable in real time: the mesoscale mass velocity variation and the mass velocity defect due to loss of the energy expended in structure formation. An internal criterion is found for the transition of a dynamically deformed material to structural instability.     

Transport and aggregation of self-propelled particles in fluid flows

An analysis of the dynamics of prolate swimming particles in laminar flow is presented. It is shown that the particles concentrate around flow regions with chaotic trajectories. When the swimming velocity is larger than a threshold, dependent on the aspect ratio of the particles, all particles escape from regular elliptic regions. For thin rodlike particles the threshold velocity vanishes; thus, the arbitrarily small swimming velocity destroys all transport boundaries. We derive an expression for the minimum swimming velocity required for escape based on a circularly symmetric flow approximation of the regular elliptic regions.     

Reduced transport of swimming particles in chaotic flow due to hydrodynamic trapping

We computationally study the transport of active, self-propelled particles suspended in a two-dimensional chaotic flow. The pointlike, spherical particles have their own intrinsic swimming velocity, which modifies the dynamical system so that the particles can break the transport barriers present in the carrier flow. Surprisingly, we find that swimming does not necessarily lead to enhanced particle transport. Small but finite swimming speed can result in reduced transport, as swimmers get stuck for long times in traps that form near elliptic islands in the background flow. Our results have implications for models of transport and encounter rates for small marine organisms.     

Chemotaxis driven instability of a confined bacterial suspension

A suspension of bacteria in a thin channel or film subject to a gradient in the concentration of a chemoattractant, will develop, in the absence of an imposed fluid flow, a steady bacteria concentration field that depends exponentially on cross-stream position. Above a critical bacteria concentration, this quiescent base state is unstable to a steady convective motion driven by the active stresses induced by the bacteria's swimming. Unlike previously identified long-wavelength instabilities of active fluids, this instability results from coupling of the bacteria concentration field with the disturbance flow.     

Concentration dependence of the collective dynamics of swimming bacteria

At concentrations near the maximum allowed by steric repulsion, swimming bacteria form a dynamical state exhibiting extended spatiotemporal coherence. The viscous fluid into which locomotive energy of individual microorganisms is transferred also carries interactions that drive the coherence. The concentration dependence of correlations in the collective state is probed here with a novel technique that herds bacteria into condensed populations of adjustable concentration. For the particular thin-film geometry employed, the correlation lengths vary smoothly and monotonically through the transition from individual to collective behavior.     

Experimental observations of detonation in ammonium-nitrate-fuel-oil (ANFO) surrounded by a high-sound-speed, shockless, aluminum confiner

Detonations in explosive mixtures of ammonium-nitrate-fuel-oil (ANFO) confined by aluminum allow for transport of detonation energy ahead of the detonation front due to the aluminum sound-speed exceeding the detonation velocity. The net effect of this energy transport on the detonation is unclear. It could enhance the detonation by precompressing the explosive near the wall. Alternatively, it could decrease the explosive performance by crushing porosity required for initiation by shock compression or destroying confinement ahead of the detonation. At present, these phenomena are not well understood. But with slowly detonating, non-ideal high explosive (NIHE) systems becoming increasing prevalent, proper understanding and prediction of the performance of these metal-confined NIHE systems is desirable. Experiments are discussed that measured the effect of ANFO detonation energy transported upstream of the front by a 76-mm-inner-diameter aluminum confining tube. Detonation velocity, detonation front-shape, and aluminum response are recorded as a function of confiner wall thickness and length. Detonation shape profiles display little curvature near the confining surface, which is attributed to energy transported upstream modifying the flow. Average detonation velocities were seen to increase with increasing confiner thickness, while wavefront curvature decreased due to the stiffer, subsonic confinement. Significant radial sidewall tube motion was observed immediately ahead of the detonation. Axial motion was also detected, which interfered with the front-shape measurements in some cases. It was concluded that the confiner was able to transport energy ahead of the detonation and that this transport has a definite effect on the detonation by modifying its characteristic shape.     

循环流化床内颗粒团流动的研究

循环流化床颗粒相流动具有多尺度效应:单颗粒运动的微尺度、颗粒团运动的介尺度和固相运动的宏尺度。颗粒相流动参数受单颗粒运动和颗粒聚团运动的制约,同时影响气相流动。基于气体分子运动论和颗粒动理学,建立相平均稠密气固两相流流动模型。介尺度模型考虑颗粒团与单颗粒之间、颗粒团与气相之间的动量和能量的传递和耗散。模拟计算颗粒容积份额、速度等参数与实测值相吻合。     

Active compaction of crosslinked driven filament networks

The contractile ability of active materials relies on the interplay of force-exerting and force-bearing structures. However, the complexity of interactions and limited parameter control of many model systems are major obstacles in advancing our understanding of the underlying fundamental principles. To shed light on these principles we introduce and analyse a minimal reconstituted system, consisting of highly concentrated actin filaments that are crosslinked by α-actinin and actively transported in the two-dimensional geometry of a motility assay. This minimal system actively compacts and evolves into highly compact fibres that exceed the length of the individual filaments by two orders of magnitude. We identify the interplay between active transport and crosslinking to be responsible for the observed active compaction. This enables us to control the structure and the length scale of active compaction.     

Hydrodynamic screening and axisymmetric turbulence in the transient sedimentation of a dilute suspension at small Reynolds number

A theory of settling of a dilute suspension of identical spherical particles in a viscous incompressible fluid is developed on the basis of the equations of transient Stokesian dynamics. The equations describe hydrodynamic interactions between particles moving under the influence of a constant force, starting to act at a particular instant of time. For a dilute suspension, a monopole approximation can be used. It is argued that the growth of velocity fluctuations is bounded by a combination of two effects, destructive interference of the flow patterns of individual particles, and a rearrangement of particle positions leading to a time-dependent microstructure of the suspension. After a long time, the microstructure tends to a steady state. The corresponding structure factor is described phenomenologically. The corresponding pair correlation function and the velocity correlation functions describing axisymmetric turbulence on the length scale of the mean distance between particles are evaluated.     

Active colloidal suspensions exhibit polar order under gravity

Recently, the steady sedimentation profile of a dilute suspension of chemically powered colloids was studied experimentally [J. Palacci et al., Phys. Rev. Lett. 105, 088304 (2010)]. It was found that the sedimentation length increases quadratically with the swimming speed of the active Brownian particles. Here we investigate theoretically the sedimentation of self-propelled particles undergoing translational and rotational diffusion. We find that the measured increase of the sedimentation length is coupled to a partial alignment of the suspension with the mean swimming direction oriented against the gravitational field. We suggest realistic parameter values to observe this polar order. Furthermore, we find that the dynamics of the active suspension can be derived from a generalized free energy functional.     

Polymer effects on small- and large-scale two-dimensional turbulence

We investigate the effect of dilute polymers on driven two-dimensional turbulence in a soap film. Transitions from strong to weak turbulence are identified by independently varying the polymer concentration phi and the energy injection rate epsilon(inj) . Studies of velocity structures in small scales reveal that strong saddles are suppressed, whereas weak ones become more populated. Interestingly, this redistribution of saddle points in turbulent flows strongly correlates with the quenching of velocity fluctuations on large scales, suggesting that this hydrodynamic structure may play a role in transferring energy from scale to scale.     

Clustering of plumes in turbulent convection

Turbulent Rayleigh-Bénard convection produces fields of intense updrafts and downdrafts that are responsible for much of the vertical heat transport. These structures, called plumes or thermals, have horizontal scales comparable to the thicknesses of the boundary layers in which they arise. In the three-dimensional numerical simulations reported here, we have observed that convective plumes organize themselves into clusters with horizontal scales that grow with time and reach the width of the computational domain. In this two-scale process, kinetic energy is transferred mainly to low horizontal wave numbers while the sizes of individual plumes remain on the scale of the boundary layer thickness.     

Statistics of particle pair relative velocity in the homogeneous shear flow

Small scale clustering of inertial particles and relative velocity of particle pairs have been fully characterized for statistically steady homogeneous isotropic flows. Depending on the particle Stokes relaxation time, the spatial distribution of the disperse phase results in a multi-scale manifold characterized by local particle concentration and voids and, because of finite inertia, the two nearby particles have high probability to exhibit large relative velocities. Both effects might explain the speed-up of particle collision rate in turbulent flows. Recently it has been shown that the large scale geometry of the flow plays a crucial role in organizing small scale particle clusters. For instance, a mean shear preferentially orients particle patterns. In this case, depending on the Stokes time, anisotropic clustering may occur even in the inertial range of scales where the turbulent fluctuations which drive the particles have already recovered isotropy. Here we consider the statistics of particle pair relative velocity in the homogeneous shear flow, the prototypical flow which manifests anisotropic clustering at small scales. We show that the mean shear, by imprinting anisotropy on the large scale velocity fluctuations, dramatically affects the particle relative velocity distribution even in the range of small scales where the anisotropic mechanisms of turbulent kinetic energy production are sub-dominant with respect to the inertial energy transfer which drives the carrier fluid velocity towards isotropy. We find that the particles’ populations which manifest strong anisotropy in their relative velocities are the same which exhibit small scale clustering. In contrast to any Kolmogorov-like picture of turbulent transport these phenomena may persist even below the smallest dissipative scales where the residual level of anisotropy may eventually blow-up. The observed anisotropy of particle relative velocity and spatial configuration is suggested to influence the directionality of the collision probability, as inferred on the basis of the so-called “ghost collision” model.     

Dynamics of cooperative transport by multiple kinesin motors and diffusing microtubule-associated proteins

In eukaryote cells, cargos are often transported cooperatively by kinesin motors and nonmotor microtubule-associated proteins (MAPs). The prior in vitro experimental data showed that the velocity of the cargo transported by kinesin motors and Ndc80 (a member of MAP) proteins of truncated coiled-coil stalks decreases sensitively with the increase of the ratio of Ndc80 to motor number. However, the underlying mechanism of Ndc80 affecting sensitively the cooperative cargo transport by kinesin motors is unclear. To understand the mechanism, here we study numerically the cooperative cargo transport by kinesin motors and Ndc80 proteins. Our results showed that for the case of the motors and Ndc80 proteins with truncated short stalks, as used in the experiments, the calculated results reproduce quantitatively the prior experimental data. The mechanism of the cargo velocity decreasing sensitively with the ratio of Ndc80 to motor number is revealed. By contrast, for the case of the motors and Ndc80 proteins with full-length long stalks, the velocity of the cargo decreases slowly with the increase in the ratio of Ndc80 to kinesin number. Our results thus give an explanation of why the kinesin motors working in the cell have long stalks.     

Visualisation and analysis of large-scale vortex structures in three-dimensional turbulent lid-driven cavity flow

In this paper, large eddy simulation (LES) of a three-dimensional turbulent lid-driven cavity (LDC) flow at Re = 10,000 has been performed using the multiple relaxation time lattice Boltzmann method. A Smagorinsky eddy viscosity model was used to represent the sub-grid scale stresses with appropriate wall damping. The prediction for the flow field was first validated by comparing the velocity profiles with previous experimental and LES studies, and then subsequently used to investigate the large-scale three-dimensional vortical structures in the LDC flow. The instantaneous three-dimensional coherent structures inside the cavity were visualised using the second invariant (Q), Δ criterion, λ₂ criterion, swirling strength (λ_ci) and streamwise vorticity. The vortex structures obtained using the different criteria in general agree well with each other. However, a cleaner visualisation of the large vortex structures was achieved with the λ_ci criterion and also when the visualisation is based on the vortex identification criteria expressed in terms of the swirling strength parameters. A major objective of the study was to perform a three-dimensional proper orthogonal decomposition (POD) on the fluctuating velocity fields. The higher energy POD modes efficiently extracted the large-scale vortical structures within the flow which were then visualised with the swirling strength criterion. Reconstruction of the instantaneous fluctuating velocity field using a finite number of POD modes indicated that the large-scale vortex structures did effectively approximate the large-scale motion. However, such a reduced order reconstruction of the flow based on the large-scale vortical structures was clearly not as effective in predicting the small-scale details of the fluctuating velocity field which relate to the turbulent transport.     

Extraction of plumes in turbulent thermal convection

We present a scheme to extract the velocity of buoyant structures in turbulent thermal convection from simultaneous local velocity and temperature measurements. Applying this scheme to measurements taken at positions within the convection cell where the buoyant structures are dominated by plumes, we obtain the temperature dependence of the plume velocity and understand our results using the equations of motion. We further obtain the scaling behavior of the average local heat flux in the vertical direction at the cell center with the Rayleigh number and find that the scaling exponent is different from that measured for the Nusselt number. This difference leads to the conclusion that heat cannot be mainly transported through the central region of the convection cell.