Journal
SOFT MATTER
Volume 6, Issue 8, Pages 1737-1747Publisher
ROYAL SOC CHEMISTRY
DOI: 10.1039/b924548k
Keywords
-
Categories
Funding
- NSF [CBET-0746285]
Ask authors/readers for more resources
Motivated by recent advances in vesicle engineering, we consider theoretically the locomotion of shape-changing bilayer vesicles at low Reynolds number. By modulating their volume and membrane composition, the vesicles can be made to change shape quasi-statically in thermal equilibrium. When the control parameters are tuned appropriately to yield periodic shape changes, which are not time-reversible, the result is a net swimming motion over one cycle of shape deformation. For two classical vesicle models ( spontaneous curvature and bilayer coupling), we numerically determine the sequence of vesicle shapes through an enthalpy minimization, as well as the fluid-body interactions by solving a boundary integral formulation of the Stokes equations. For both models, net locomotion can be obtained either by continuously modulating fore-aft asymmetric vesicle shapes or by crossing a continuous shape-transition region and alternating between fore-aft asymmetric and fore-aft symmetric shapes. The obtained hydrodynamic efficiencies are similar to those of other low Reynolds number biological swimmers and suggest that shape-changing vesicles might provide an alternative to flagella-based synthetic microswimmers.
Authors
I am an author on this paper
Click your name to claim this paper and add it to your profile.
Reviews
Recommended
No Data Available