Hydrodynamic Fluctuations and Instabilities in Ordered Suspensions of Self-Propelled Particles

Simha, Aditi R and Ramaswamy, Sriram (2002) Hydrodynamic Fluctuations and Instabilities in Ordered Suspensions of Self-Propelled Particles. In: Physical Review Letters, 89 (5). 058101/1-4.

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Abstract

We construct the hydrodynamic equations for suspensions of self-propelled particles (SPPs) with spontaneous orientational order, and make a number of striking, testable predictions: (i) Nematic SPP suspensions are always absolutely unstable at long wavelengths. (ii) SPP suspensions support novel propagating modes at long wavelengths, coupling orientation, flow, and concentration. (iii) In a wave number regime accessible only in low Reynolds number systems such as bacteria, polar-ordered suspensions are invariably convectively unstable. (iv) The variance in the number N of particles, divided by the mean <N>, diverges as <N>2/3 in polar-ordered SPP suspensions.

Item Type:	Journal Article
Publication:	Physical Review Letters
Publisher:	American Physical Society (APS)
Additional Information:	Copyright for this article belongs to American Physical Society (APS).
Department/Centre:	Division of Physical & Mathematical Sciences > Physics
Date Deposited:	10 Nov 2004
Last Modified:	19 Sep 2010 04:17
URI:	http://eprints.iisc.ac.in/id/eprint/2301

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