Helical flow states in active nematics

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Volume Title

A1 Alkuperäisartikkeli tieteellisessä aikakauslehdessä

Date

2022-07

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en

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6

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Physical Review E, Volume 106, issue 1, pp. 1-6

Abstract

We show that confining extensile nematics in three-dimensional (3D) channels leads to the emergence of two self-organized flow states with nonzero helicity. The first is a pair of braided antiparallel streams - this double helix occurs when the activity is moderate, anchoring negligible, and reduced temperature high. The second consists of axially aligned counter-rotating vortices - this grinder train arises between spontaneous axial streaming and the vortex lattice. These two unanticipated helical flow states illustrate the potential of active fluids to break symmetries and form complex but organized spatiotemporal structures in 3D fluidic devices.

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Funding Information: We thank Kevin Stratford and Kristian Thijssen for invaluable help. This research has received funding (TNS) from the European Research Council under the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme (Grant Agreement No. 851196). S.P.T. acknowledges the support by the Department of Science and Technology, India, via Research Grant No. CRG/2018/000644. T.A.-N. has been supported in part by the Academy of Finland PolyDyna (No. 307806) and QFT Center of Excellence Program grant (No. 312298). Publisher Copyright: © 2022 American Physical Society.

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Keogh, R R, Chandragiri, S, Loewe, B, Ala-Nissila, T, Thampi, S P & Shendruk, T N 2022, ' Helical flow states in active nematics ', Physical Review E, vol. 106, no. 1, L012602, pp. 1-6 . https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevE.106.L012602