arXiv subjects

Amir Nourhani

Publications and source records attributed to Amir Nourhani.

12 recordsLinked to original sources

arXiv2025

Classical triangular lattice antiferromagnetic Ising model as a free-fermion/superconductor system

We present a treatment of the triangular lattice antiferromagnetic Ising model (TAFIM) based on a small number of elementary ideas common to statistical and solid-state physics. The TAFIM is represented as a reduced BCS model in one space, one (imaginary) time dimension. The representation is approximate for nonzero temperature, but allows quick derivation of asymptotically exact thermodynamic functions, and the divergence of the spin-spin correlation length. The fermionic representation is exact at zero temperature. We demonstrate the existence of a two-dimensional continuum of zero-temperature equilibrium macrostates characterized by satisfied bond fractions of the three different orientations, and calculate their entropy densities.

cond-mat.stat-mech↗

arXiv2024

Biomimetic Swarm of Active Particles with Coupled Passive-Active Interactions

We study the universal behavior of a class of active colloids whose design is inspired by the collective dynamics of natural systems like schools of fish and flocks of birds. These colloids, with off-center repulsive interaction sites, self-organize into polar swarms exhibiting long-range order and directional motion without significant hydrodynamic interactions. Our simulations show that the system transitions from motile perfect crystals to solid-like, liquid-like and gas-like states depending on noise levels, repulsive interaction strength, and particle density. By analyzing swarm polarity and hexatic bond order parameters, we demonstrate that effective volume fractions based on force-range and torque-range interactions explain the system's universal behavior. This work lays a groundwork for biomimetic applications utilizing the cooperative dynamics of active colloids.

cond-mat.soft↗

arXiv2024

Swimmer-Types of Optimum Surface-Driven Active Particles

An optimal microswimmer with a given geometry has a surface velocity profile that minimizes energy dissipation for a given swimming speed. An axisymmetric swimmer can be puller-, pusher-, or neutral-type depending on the sign of the stresslet strength. We numerically investigate the type of optimal surface-driven active microswimmers using a minimum dissipation theorem for optimum microswimmers. We examine the hydrodynamic resistance and stresslet strength with nonlinear dependence on various deformation modes. The results show that microswimmers with fore-and-aft symmetry exhibit neutral-type behavior, while asymmetrical geometries exhibit pusher-, puller-type or neutral-type behavior, depending on the dominant deformation mode and the nonlinear dependence of the stresslet for an optimum microswimmer on deformation mode and amplitude.

physics.flu-dyn↗

arXiv2020

Self-Healing Small-Scale Swimmers

Herein, self-healing small-scale swimmers capable of autonomous propulsion and on-the-fly structural recovery are described. The new strategy instantaneously restores the functionality of the swimmer after it has suffered severe damage. Incorporation of magnetic microparticles in strips along with the printed functional body layers (consisting of conductive carbon, low-density hydrophobic polymer and catalytically active metal) results in rapid reorientation and reattachment of the moving damaged catalytic tail to its complimentary broken static body piece. Such magnetic alignment and attraction restores the original swimmer structure and propulsion behavior, independent of user input, displaying healing efficiencies as high as 88 percent. Modeling of the magnetic fields and simulations of various swimmer configurations are used to study the magnetic force field distribution around the swimmers. The influence of the damage position and pattern of multiple magnetic healing strips is examined and their influence upon healing efficiency is compared. Owing to its versatility, fast recovery, simplicity, and efficiency, the new on-the-fly self-healing strategy represents an important step towards the development of new classes of robots that can regain their functionality in situations of extreme mechanical damage where repair is not possible or challenging.

cond-mat.soft↗

arXiv2018

Triangular Ising antiferromagnet through a fermionic lens, part 2: information-theoretic aspects of zero-temperature states on cylinders

A classical lattice spin model wrapped on a cylinder is profitably viewed as a chain of rings of spins. From that perspective, mutual information between ring configurations plays much the same role as spin-spin correlation functions in simpler settings. We study zero-temperature states of triangular lattice Ising antiferromagnet (TIAFM) systems from this point of view using a fermionic representation presented in a companion paper (Part 1). On infinite cylinders, ring-to-ring mutual information falls off asymptotically at a rate which decreases smoothly with cylinder circumference, but the end-to-end mutual information for finite cylinders depends strongly on the residue class modulo 3 of the circumference as well as on whether spin periodicity or antiperiodicity is imposed in the circumferential direction. In some cases, the falloff is only as the inverse square of the cylinder length. These features, puzzling within the original spin formulation, are easily understood and calculated within the fermionic formulation.

cond-mat.stat-mech↗

arXiv2018

Extrapolation theory for Stokes flow past a deformed sphere

We formulate a method for computing Stokes flow past a highly deformed sphere with arbitrarily defined surface velocity. The fundamental ingredient is an explicit extrapolation operator extending a velocity field from the surface of a sphere, which is expressed in terms of a complete set of basis Stokes fields for the pressure and velocity derived from scalar and vector spherical harmonics. We present a matrix algebra packaging suitable for numerical computation to arbitrary order in the deformation amplitude (deviation from sphericity). The hydrodynamic force and torque on a deformed sphere with arbitrary surface velocity are expressed in terms of basis field amplitudes, and for the classic problem of a rotating and translating rigid body, we compute explicitly the first order in deformation corrections to the flow field as well as the hydrodynamic force and torque.

cond-mat.soft↗

arXiv2017

Communicating through a geometrically frustrated channel

We propose an intuitively appealing formulation of the zero-temperature triangular lattice Ising antiferromagnet (TIAFM) on a cylinder as a model of noninteracting fermions hopping on a ring and evolving in imaginary time with pair annihilation events. Among the features of the model which can then be related to local semi-conservation of particle number are: infinite-range influence of boundary conditions, multiple "zero temperature pure phases" in the infinite-length limit differing in entropy density, sensitivity of the asymptotic rate of decay (with respect to length) of mutual information between end configurations to circumference modulo 3, and even the known power-law falloff of the spin-spin correlator on an infinite plane. The ability of boundary conditions to determine the bulk entropy density enables communication between the two far-separated ends of such a cylinder even when all pair-wise spin-spin correlations between the ends are vanishingly small. In the fermionic language, breakdown of these zero-temperature phenomena at positive temperature is understood as passage of the system into a superconducting phase.

cond-mat.stat-mech↗

arXiv2016

Spiral diffusion of rotating self-propellers with stochastic perturbation

Translationally diffusive behavior arising from the combination of orientational diffusion and powered motion at microscopic scales is a known phenomenon, but the peculiarities of the evolution of expected position conditioned on initial position and orientation have been neglected. A theory is given of the spiral motion of the mean trajectory depending upon propulsion speed, angular velocity, orientational diffusion and rate of random chirality reversal. We demonstrate the experimental accessibility of this effect using both tadpole-like and Janus sphere dimer rotating motors. Sensitivity of the mean trajectory to the kinematic parameters suggest that it may be a useful way to determine those parameters.

cond-mat.soft↗

arXiv2016

Bypassing slip velocity: rotational and translational velocities of autophoretic colloids in terms of surface flux

A standard approach to propulsion velocities of autophoretic colloids with thin interaction layers uses a reciprocity relation applied to the slip velocity. But the surface flux (chemical, electrical, thermal, etc.), which is the source of the field driving the slip is often more accessible. We show how, under conditions of low Reynolds number and a field obeying the Laplace equation in the outer region, the slip velocity can be bypassed in velocity calculations. In a sense, the actual slip velocity and a normal field proportional to the flux density are equivalent for this type of calculation. Using known results for surface traction induced by rotating or translating an inert particle in a quiescent fluid, we derive simple and explicit integral formulas for translational and rotational velocities of arbitrary spheroidal and slender-body autophoretic colloids.

cond-mat.soft↗

arXiv2016

Efficacy of self-phoretic colloids and microswimmers

Within a unified formulation, encompassing self-electrophoresis, self-diffusiophoresis, and self-thermophoresis, we provide a simple integral kernel transforming the relevant surface flux to particle velocity for any spheroid with axisymmetric surface activity and uniform phoretic mobility. We define efficacy, a dimensionless efficiency-like quantity expressing the speed resulting from unit absolute flux density on the surface, which allows a meaningful comparison of the performance of different motor designs. For bipartite designs with piecewise uniform flux over complementary surface regions, the efficacy is mapped out over the entire range of geometry (discotic through sphere to rod-like) and of bipartitioning, and intermediate aspect ratios that maximize efficacy are identified. Comparison is made to experimental data from the literature.

cond-mat.soft↗

arXiv2014

Kinematic matrix theory and universalities in self-propellers and active swimmers

We describe an efficient and parsimonious matrix-based theory for studying the ensemble behavior of self-propellers and active swimmers, such as nanomotors or motile bacteria, that are typically studied by differential-equation-based Langevin or Fokker-Planck formalisms. The kinematic effects for elementary processes of motion are incorporated into a matrix, called the "kinematrix", from which we immediately obtain correlators and the mean and variance of angular and position variables (and thus effective diffusivity) by simple matrix algebra. The kinematrix formalism enables us recast the behaviors of a diverse range of self-propellers into a unified form, revealing universalities in their ensemble behavior in terms of new emergent time scales. Active fluctuations and hydrodynamic interactions can be expressed as an additive composition of separate self-propellers.

cond-mat.soft↗

arXiv2014

Gaussian Memory in Kinematic Matrix Theory for Self-Propellers

We extend the kinematic matrix ("kinematrix") formalism [Phys. Rev. E 89, 062304 (2014)], which via simple matrix algebra accesses ensemble properties of self-propellers influenced by uncorrelated noise, to treat Gaussian correlated noises. This extension brings into reach many real-world biological and biomimetic self-propellers for which inertia is significant. Applying the formalism, we analyze in detail ensemble behaviors of a 2D self-propeller with velocity fluctuations and orientation evolution driven by an Ornstein-Uhlenbeck process. On the basis of exact results, a variety of dynamical regimes determined by the inertial, speed-fluctuation, orientational diffusion, and emergent disorientation time scales are delineated and discussed.

cond-mat.soft↗