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Updated: Aug 24, 2026

An Analog Macroscopic Technique for Studying Molecular Hydrodynamic Processes in Dense Gases and Liquids
Published on: December 4, 2017
Stability and dynamics of crystals and glasses of motorized particles
1Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, University of California at San Diego and Center for Theoretical Biological Physics, La Jolla, CA 92093-0371, USA.
Abstract:
Many of the large structures of the cell, such as the cytoskeleton, are assembled and maintained far from equilibrium. We study the stabilities of various structures for a simple model of such a far-from-equilibrium organized assembly in which spherical particles move under the influence of attached motors. From the variational solutions of the many-body master equation for Brownian motion with motorized kicking we obtain a closed equation for the order parameter of localization. Thus, we obtain the transition criterion for localization and stability limits for the crystalline phase and frozen amorphous structures of motorized particles. The theory also allows an estimate of nonequilibrium effective temperatures characterizing the response and fluctuations of motorized asemblies.
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