Externally driven condensates show translation-induced polarization, directed coalescence, and anomalous diffusion in viscoelastic media

Abstract

Phase separation into compositionally and physically distinct domains is ubiquitous in (non)living matter ranging from alloys and emulsions to biomolecular condensates in cells. The organization of these domains can be controlled, for example, by nonequilibrium chemical reactions, external fields, or mechanical stresses. In this context, stationary states can emerge from effective long-range interactions resembling the electrostatics of charges. As shown here, externally controlled dynamic states, such as condensate motion, lead to an effective polarization and dipolar force fields even for microscopically nonpolarizable matter. The dipole-dipole interactions resulting from this \emph{translation-induced polarization} cause directed coalescence of domains. This coarsening mechanism complements Ostwald ripening and coalescence due to Brownian motion or Marangoni flows, and has implications for controlling domains by electric fields or concentration gradients. Interestingly, the chemical potential gradients around a domain that nucleates material are exactly opposite to the hydrodynamic pressure gradients around an impermeable colloid that pushes the fluid, suggesting a competition between phase separation and hydrodynamics. In addition to chemical control, the motion of domains can also be driven by mechanical stresses. An example is the cell interior, where mechanical stresses are actively generated by molecular motors and opposed by passive viscoelastic stresses in the cytoplasm and nucleoplasm. The resulting fluid flows lead to Brownian motion with a suppressed or enhanced size scaling which modifies collision-coalescence. For active stresses with a long correlation time, the domains show superdiffusion on intermediate time scales. Together, these findings shed new light on the dynamics of domains in viscoelastic media and conserved order parameters in general.