Pickl K, Pande J, Köstler H, Rüde U, Smith AS (2017)
Publication Status: Published
Publication Type: Journal article, Original article
Publication year: 2017
Publisher: IOP PUBLISHING LTD
Book Volume: 29
Article Number: 124001
Journal Issue: 12
URI: http://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1361-648X/aa5a40
Propulsion at low Reynolds numbers is often studied by defining artificial microswimmers which exhibit a particular stroke. The disadvantage of such an approach is that the stroke does not adjust to the environment, in particular the fluid flow, which can diminish the effect of hydrodynamic interactions. To overcome this limitation, we simulate a microswimmer consisting of three beads connected by springs and dampers, using the self-developed waLBerla and pe framework based on the lattice Boltzmann method and the discrete element method. In our approach, the swimming stroke of a swimmer emerges as a balance of the drag, the driving and the elastic internal forces. We validate the simulations by comparing the obtained swimming velocity to the velocity found analytically using a perturbative method where the bead oscillations are taken to be small. Including higher-order terms in the hydrodynamic interactions between the beads improves the agreement to the simulations in parts of the parameter space. Encouraged by the agreement between the theory and the simulations and aided by the massively parallel capabilities of the waLBerla-pe framework, we simulate more than ten thousand such swimmers together, thus presenting the first fully resolved simulations of large swarms with active responsive components.
APA:
Pickl, K., Pande, J., Köstler, H., Rüde, U., & Smith, A.-S. (2017). Lattice Boltzmann simulations of the bead-spring microswimmer with a responsive stroke-from an individual to swarms. Journal of Physics: Condensed Matter, 29(12). https://dx.doi.org/10.1088/1361-648X/aa5a40
MLA:
Pickl, Kristina, et al. "Lattice Boltzmann simulations of the bead-spring microswimmer with a responsive stroke-from an individual to swarms." Journal of Physics: Condensed Matter 29.12 (2017).
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