Issue |
EPL
Volume 101, Number 4, February 2013
|
|
---|---|---|
Article Number | 44008 | |
Number of page(s) | 6 | |
Section | Electromagnetism, Optics, Acoustics, Heat Transfer, Classical Mechanics, and Fluid Dynamics | |
DOI | https://doi.org/10.1209/0295-5075/101/44008 | |
Published online | 05 March 2013 |
Swimming active droplet: A theoretical analysis
Institut für Theoretische Physik, Technische Universität Berlin - Hardenbergstraße 36, 10623 Berlin, Germany, EU
Received: 9 October 2012
Accepted: 8 February 2012
Recently, an active microswimmer was constructed where a micron-sized droplet of bromine water was placed into a surfactant-laden oil phase. Due to a bromination reaction of the surfactant at the interface, the surface tension locally increases and becomes non-uniform. This drives a Marangoni flow which propels the squirming droplet forward. We develop a diffusion-advection-reaction equation for the order parameter of the surfactant mixture at the droplet interface using a mixing free energy. Numerical solutions reveal a stable swimming regime above a critical Marangoni number M but also stopping and oscillating states when M is increased further. The swimming droplet is identified as a pusher whereas in the oscillating state it oscillates between being a puller and a pusher.
PACS: 47.20.Dr – Surface-tension-driven instability / 47.55.D- – Drops and bubbles / 47.55.pf – Marangoni convection
© EPLA, 2013
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