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Journal Articles Physical Review Letters Year : 2012

Dynamic Clustering in Active Colloidal Suspensions with Chemical Signaling

Abstract

In this Letter, we explore experimentally the phase behavior of a dense active suspension of self-propelled colloids. In addition to a solidlike and gaslike phase observed for high and low densities, a novel cluster phase is reported at intermediate densities. This takes the form of a stationary assembly of dense aggregates—resulting from a permanent dynamical merging and separation of active colloids—whose average size grows with activity as a linear function of the self-propelling velocity. While different possible scenarios can be considered to account for these observations—such as a generic velocity weakening instability recently put forward—we show that the experimental results are reproduced mathematically by a chemotactic aggregation mechanism, originally introduced to account for bacterial aggregation and accounting here for diffusiophoretic chemical interaction between colloidal swimmers.
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hal-01628778 , version 1 (09-12-2017)

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I. Theurkauff, Cécile Cottin-Bizonne, J. Palacci, C. Ybert, L. Bocquet. Dynamic Clustering in Active Colloidal Suspensions with Chemical Signaling. Physical Review Letters, 2012, 108 (26), ⟨10.1103/PhysRevLett.108.268303⟩. ⟨hal-01628778⟩
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