Exploiting compositional disorder in collectives of light-driven circle walkers

Area of Science:

• Physics
• Robotics
• Materials Science

Background:

• Programmable active matter offers potential for micro- and nanoscale tasks.
• Theoretical understanding of physical principles, especially steric interactions, is lacking.

Purpose of the Study:

• Investigate emergent behavior in light-driven robotic walkers.
• Explore the impact of individual property variations on collective dynamics.

Main Methods:

• Studied light-driven walkers propelled by internal vibrations.
• Modeled walker dynamics using active Brownian particles with varying angular speeds.
• Employed numerical simulations to analyze collective behaviors.

Main Results:

• Walker dynamics align with active Brownian particle models, despite individual speed differences.
• Polydispersity in angular speeds leads to self-sorting under confinement.
• Observed enhancement in translational diffusion due to property variations.

Conclusions:

• Individual property disorder, not just imperfection, can enable programmable active matter.
• Demonstrated self-sorting and enhanced diffusion as emergent behaviors from disordered units.
• Provides insights into designing active matter systems with tunable collective properties.