Journal
JOURNAL OF PHYSICS-CONDENSED MATTER
Volume 27, Issue 19, Pages -Publisher
IOP PUBLISHING LTD
DOI: 10.1088/0953-8984/27/19/194110
Keywords
self-propelled particles; anisotropic microswimmers; active colloids
Categories
Funding
- Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) [SPP 1726, WI 4170/1-2, BE 1788/13-1, LO 418/17-1]
- Marie Curie-Initial Training Network Comploid - European Union
- ERC [267499]
- EPSRC [EP/J007404]
- Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council [EP/J007404/1] Funding Source: researchfish
- EPSRC [EP/J007404/1] Funding Source: UKRI
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The self-propulsion of artificial and biological microswimmers (or active colloidal particles) has often been modelled by using a force and a torque entering into the overdamped equations for the Brownian motion of passive particles. This seemingly contradicts the fact that a swimmer is force-free and torque-free, i.e. that the net force and torque on the particle vanish. Using different models for mechanical and diffusiophoretic self-propulsion, we demonstrate here that the equations of motion of microswimmers can be mapped onto those of passive particles with the shape-dependent grand resistance matrix and formally external effective forces and torques. This is consistent with experimental findings on the circular motion of artificial asymmetric microswimmers driven by self-diffusiophoresis. The concept of effective self-propulsion forces and torques significantly facilitates the understanding of the swimming paths, e.g. for a microswimmer under gravity. However, this concept has its limitations when the self-propulsion mechanism of a swimmer is disturbed either by another particle in its close vicinity or by interactions with obstacles, such as a wall.
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