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Taylor's swimming sheet near a soft boundary
Aditya Jha1, Yacine Amarouchene1, Thomas Salez1
1Univ. Bordeaux, CNRS, LOMA, UMR 5798, F-33405 Talence, France. aditya.jha@u-bordeaux.fr.
Soft Matter
|January 9, 2025
Summary
Microorganisms swim using wavy flagella. This study shows soft boundaries alter swimming speed, decreasing it for transverse waves and increasing it for longitudinal waves, impacting energetics and fluid power.
Area of Science:
- Fluid dynamics
- Biophysics
- Microbiology
Background:
- G. I. Taylor's 1951 model described microorganism swimming via waves on an infinite sheet in a viscous medium.
- Further developments captured metachronal wave efficiency in ciliates.
- Previous studies addressed rigid boundaries and complex environments.
Purpose of the Study:
- To investigate the hydrodynamic corrections induced by a nearby soft boundary on swimming microorganisms.
- To analyze the impact of soft boundaries on swimming velocity, energetics, and fluid power.
Main Methods:
- Utilized a simplified analytical model based on G. I. Taylor's work.
- Explored the effects of transverse and longitudinal waves on swimming velocity near soft boundaries.
- Analyzed the energetics and boundary deformation, including oscillation synchronization.
Main Results:
- Swimming velocity magnitude is modified by soft boundaries.
- Transverse waves reduce swimming velocity, while longitudinal waves increase it.
- Identified synchronization between boundary oscillations and sheet waves, altering power exerted on the fluid.
Conclusions:
- Soft boundaries significantly influence microswimming dynamics.
- The model provides analytical insights into generic behaviors relevant to microswimming in soft environments.
- Findings are crucial for understanding microorganism locomotion in biological and engineered soft materials.
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