Synchronization of flexible sheets

DOI10.1017/S0022112011000814MaRDI QIDQ2891535zbMATH OpenOpenAlexFDO

Authors Gwynn J. Elfring, Eric Lauga

Publication date 15 June 2012

Published in Journal of Fluid Mechanics (Search for Journal in Brave)

Full work available at URL https://arxiv.org/abs/1108.5791

zbMATH Keywords

biological fluid dynamicslow-Reynolds-number flowsmicro-organism dynamics

Mathematics Subject Classification ID

Biopropulsion in water and in air (76Z10) Biomechanics (92C10)

Abstract: When swimming in close proximity, some microorganisms such as spermatozoa synchronize their flagella. Previous work on swimming sheets showed that such synchronization requires a geometrical asymmetry in the flagellar waveforms. Here we inquire about a physical mechanism responsible for such symmetry-breaking in nature. Using a two-dimensional model, we demonstrate that flexible sheets with symmetric internal forcing, deform when interacting with each other via a thin fluid layer in such a way as to systematically break the overall waveform symmetry, thereby always evolving to an in-phase conformation where energy dissipation is minimized. This dynamics is shown to be mathematically equivalent to that obtained for prescribed waveforms in viscoelastic fluids, emphasizing the crucial role of elasticity in symmetry-breaking and synchronization.

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Cited in

(9)

• A Bayesian framework to estimate fluid and material parameters in micro-swimmer models
• Hydrodynamic interactions of sheets vs filaments: synchronization, attraction, and alignment
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• An actuated elastic sheet interacting with passive and active structures in a viscoelastic fluid
• Batchelor Prize Lecture: Fluid dynamics at the scale of the cell
• Synchronization of Protein Motors Modeled by Asynchronous Cellular Automata
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