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arXiv · 2503.15744

Transient Chirality in the Gelation of Adhesive Spinner Monolayers

Yujie Jiang·Haiquan Li·Yiting Liu·Haoran Li·Yang Cui
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Abstract

Active systems of self-rotating elements inherently exhibit chirality, making them of fundamental interest due to parity violation. Using large-scale hydrodynamic simulations, we investigate the gelation of adhesive spinners confined to quasi-2D monolayers at low Reynolds numbers. Unlike the coarsening dynamics of passive colloids, spinner gelation follows a different pathway, displaying structural chirality during the early stages of aggregation. However, this chirality dissipates upon dynamical arrest, resulting in a final gel structure that resembles a conventional colloidal gel. As a result, we find no sign of odd mechanical responses. Nonetheless, the elastic modulus and gelation time remain tunable through spinning activity, providing a new avenue for the bottom-up design of programmable soft materials.

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Yujie Jiang, Haiquan Li, Yiting Liu, Haoran Li, Yang Cui. 2025-03-19. Transient Chirality in the Gelation of Adhesive Spinner Monolayers. https://arxiv.org/abs/2503.15744

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