IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/nat/natcom/v13y2022i1d10.1038_s41467-022-34336-z.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Active boundary layers in confined active nematics

Author

Listed:
  • Jerôme Hardoüin

    (Universitat de Barcelona
    Universitat de Barcelona)

  • Claire Doré

    (Laboratoire Gulliver, UMR CNRS 7636, ESPCI Paris, PSL Research University)

  • Justine Laurent

    (Laboratoire Gulliver, UMR CNRS 7636, ESPCI Paris, PSL Research University)

  • Teresa Lopez-Leon

    (Laboratoire Gulliver, UMR CNRS 7636, ESPCI Paris, PSL Research University)

  • Jordi Ignés-Mullol

    (Universitat de Barcelona
    Universitat de Barcelona)

  • Francesc Sagués

    (Universitat de Barcelona
    Universitat de Barcelona)

Abstract

The role of boundary layers in conventional liquid crystals is commonly related to the mesogen anchoring on confining walls. In the classical view, anchoring enslaves the orientational field of the passive material under equilibrium conditions. In this work, we show that an active nematic can develop active boundary layers that topologically polarize the confining walls. We find that negatively-charged defects accumulate in the boundary layer, regardless of the wall curvature, and they influence the overall dynamics of the system to the point of fully controlling the behavior of the active nematic in situations of strong confinement. Further, we show that wall defects exhibit behaviors that are essentially different from those of their bulk counterparts, such as high motility or the ability to recombine with another defect of like-sign topological charge. These exotic behaviors result from a change of symmetry induced by the wall in the director field around the defect. Finally, we suggest that the collective dynamics of wall defects might be described in terms of a model equation for one-dimensional spatio-temporal chaos.

Suggested Citation

  • Jerôme Hardoüin & Claire Doré & Justine Laurent & Teresa Lopez-Leon & Jordi Ignés-Mullol & Francesc Sagués, 2022. "Active boundary layers in confined active nematics," Nature Communications, Nature, vol. 13(1), pages 1-9, December.
  • Handle: RePEc:nat:natcom:v:13:y:2022:i:1:d:10.1038_s41467-022-34336-z
    DOI: 10.1038/s41467-022-34336-z
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-022-34336-z
    File Function: Abstract
    Download Restriction: no

    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1038/s41467-022-34336-z?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. P. Guillamat & J. Ignés-Mullol & F. Sagués, 2017. "Taming active turbulence with patterned soft interfaces," Nature Communications, Nature, vol. 8(1), pages 1-8, December.
    2. Bohdan Senyuk & Qingkun Liu & Sailing He & Randall D. Kamien & Robert B. Kusner & Tom C. Lubensky & Ivan I. Smalyukh, 2013. "Topological colloids," Nature, Nature, vol. 493(7431), pages 200-205, January.
    3. Tim Sanchez & Daniel T. N. Chen & Stephen J. DeCamp & Michael Heymann & Zvonimir Dogic, 2012. "Spontaneous motion in hierarchically assembled active matter," Nature, Nature, vol. 491(7424), pages 431-434, November.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Nishkantha Arulkumaran & Mervyn Singer & Stefan Howorka & Jonathan R. Burns, 2023. "Creating complex protocells and prototissues using simple DNA building blocks," Nature Communications, Nature, vol. 14(1), pages 1-13, December.
    2. Bibi Najma & Minu Varghese & Lev Tsidilkovski & Linnea Lemma & Aparna Baskaran & Guillaume Duclos, 2022. "Competing instabilities reveal how to rationally design and control active crosslinked gels," Nature Communications, Nature, vol. 13(1), pages 1-10, December.
    3. Salgado-García, R., 2022. "Active particles in reactive disordered media: How does adsorption affect diffusion?," Physica A: Statistical Mechanics and its Applications, Elsevier, vol. 603(C).
    4. Tom Brandstätter & David B. Brückner & Yu Long Han & Ricard Alert & Ming Guo & Chase P. Broedersz, 2023. "Curvature induces active velocity waves in rotating spherical tissues," Nature Communications, Nature, vol. 14(1), pages 1-11, December.
    5. Mallikarjun, Rahul & Pal, Arnab, 2023. "Chiral run-and-tumble walker: Transport and optimizing search," Physica A: Statistical Mechanics and its Applications, Elsevier, vol. 622(C).
    6. Antonio Lamura & Adriano Tiribocchi, 2021. "Shearing Effects on the Phase Coarsening of Binary Mixtures Using the Active Model B," Mathematics, MDPI, vol. 9(23), pages 1-13, November.
    7. Bo Zhang & Andreas Glatz & Igor S. Aranson & Alexey Snezhko, 2023. "Spontaneous shock waves in pulse-stimulated flocks of Quincke rollers," Nature Communications, Nature, vol. 14(1), pages 1-8, December.
    8. López-Alamilla, N.J. & Challis, K.J. & Deaker, A.G. & Jack, M.W., 2023. "The effect of futile chemical cycles on chemical-to-mechanical energy conversion in interacting motor protein systems," Physica A: Statistical Mechanics and its Applications, Elsevier, vol. 615(C).
    9. Su, Yan, 2024. "A mesoscale non-dimensional lattice Boltzmann model for self-sustained structures of swimming microbial suspensions," Physica A: Statistical Mechanics and its Applications, Elsevier, vol. 642(C).
    10. Teagan E. Bate & Megan E. Varney & Ezra H. Taylor & Joshua H. Dickie & Chih-Che Chueh & Michael M. Norton & Kun-Ta Wu, 2022. "Self-mixing in microtubule-kinesin active fluid from nonuniform to uniform distribution of activity," Nature Communications, Nature, vol. 13(1), pages 1-14, December.
    11. Tong An & Xinyu Jiang & Feng Gao & Christian Schäfer & Junjun Qiu & Nan Shi & Xiaokun Song & Manyao Zhang & Chris E. Finlayson & Xuezhi Zheng & Xiuhong Li & Feng Tian & Bin Zhu & Tan Sui & Xianhong Ha, 2024. "Strain to shine: stretching-induced three-dimensional symmetries in nanoparticle-assembled photonic crystals," Nature Communications, Nature, vol. 15(1), pages 1-11, December.
    12. Xiaobin Dai & Xuanyu Zhang & Lijuan Gao & Ziyang Xu & Li-Tang Yan, 2022. "Topology mediates transport of nanoparticles in macromolecular networks," Nature Communications, Nature, vol. 13(1), pages 1-8, December.
    13. A. Tiribocchi & M. Durve & M. Lauricella & A. Montessori & D. Marenduzzo & S. Succi, 2023. "The crucial role of adhesion in the transmigration of active droplets through interstitial orifices," Nature Communications, Nature, vol. 14(1), pages 1-12, December.
    14. Goswami, Koushik, 2019. "Work fluctuation relations for a dragged Brownian particle in active bath," Physica A: Statistical Mechanics and its Applications, Elsevier, vol. 525(C), pages 223-233.
    15. Jack Paget & Marco G. Mazza & Andrew J. Archer & Tyler N. Shendruk, 2023. "Complex-tensor theory of simple smectics," Nature Communications, Nature, vol. 14(1), pages 1-13, December.
    16. Alexander Ziepke & Ivan Maryshev & Igor S. Aranson & Erwin Frey, 2022. "Multi-scale organization in communicating active matter," Nature Communications, Nature, vol. 13(1), pages 1-10, December.
    17. Yuan Shen & Ingo Dierking, 2022. "Electrically tunable collective motion of dissipative solitons in chiral nematic films," Nature Communications, Nature, vol. 13(1), pages 1-12, December.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:nat:natcom:v:13:y:2022:i:1:d:10.1038_s41467-022-34336-z. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.nature.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.