Designing Novel Artificial Microswimmers
Schematic illustrating how our model microswimmer (right) can be used to model swimmers with swirl like the bacteria E. coli (left).Microorganisms must often navigate through biological fluids (e.g. biofilms) that are viscoelastic, meaning they behave both as a liquid and a solid. In this paper, we use computational fluid dynamics and theoretical analysis to design a model microswimmer consisting of two-counterrotating spheres of different sizes. This artificial swimmer creates a flow field similar to that of microorganisms that swim with swirl like the bacteria E. coli, which propels itself with its rotating flagellar bundle. This new microswimmer could play an important role in studying the effect of fluid elasticity on motility by replacing live organisms in experiments (which are notoriously difficult to control).
This work was featured in Physics as a Synopsis article ( How a Swirling Tail Helps Microbes Swim ) and was selected as an Editors’ Suggestion in Physical Review Fluids.
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