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Main Authors: Cai, Xinwei, Wang, Kuiliang, Li, Gaojin, Bian, Xin
Format: Preprint
Published: 2024
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Online Access:https://arxiv.org/abs/2411.13893
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author Cai, Xinwei
Wang, Kuiliang
Li, Gaojin
Bian, Xin
author_facet Cai, Xinwei
Wang, Kuiliang
Li, Gaojin
Bian, Xin
contents Microswimmers play an important role in shaping the world around us. The squirmer is a simple model for microswimmer whose cilia oscillations on its spherical surface induce an effective slip velocity to propel itself. The rapid development of computational fluid dynamics methods has markedly enhanced our capacity to study the behavior of squirmers in aqueous environments. Nevertheless, a unified methodology that can fully address the complexity of fluid-solid coupling at multiple scales and interface tracking for multiphase flows remains elusive, posing an outstanding challenge to the field. To this end, we investigate the potential of the smoothed particle dynamics (SPD) method as an alternative approach for simulating squirmers. The Lagrangian nature of the method allows it to effectively address the aforementioned difficulty. By introducing a novel treatment of the boundary condition and assigning appropriate slip velocities to the boundary particles, the SPD-squirmer model is able to accurately represent a range of microswimmer types including pushers, neutral swimmers, and pullers. We systematically validate the steady-state velocity of the squirmer, the resulting flow field, its hydrodynamic interactions with the surrounding environment, and the mutual collision of two squirmers. In the presence of Brownian motion, the model is also able to correctly calculate the velocity and angular velocity autocorrelation functions at the mesoscale. Finally, we simulate a squirmer within a multiphase flow by considering a droplet that encloses a squirmer and imposing a surface tension between the two flow phases. We find that the squirmer within the droplet exhibits different motion types.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2411_13893
institution arXiv
publishDate 2024
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Simulating squirmers with smoothed particle dynamics
Cai, Xinwei
Wang, Kuiliang
Li, Gaojin
Bian, Xin
Fluid Dynamics
Soft Condensed Matter
Microswimmers play an important role in shaping the world around us. The squirmer is a simple model for microswimmer whose cilia oscillations on its spherical surface induce an effective slip velocity to propel itself. The rapid development of computational fluid dynamics methods has markedly enhanced our capacity to study the behavior of squirmers in aqueous environments. Nevertheless, a unified methodology that can fully address the complexity of fluid-solid coupling at multiple scales and interface tracking for multiphase flows remains elusive, posing an outstanding challenge to the field. To this end, we investigate the potential of the smoothed particle dynamics (SPD) method as an alternative approach for simulating squirmers. The Lagrangian nature of the method allows it to effectively address the aforementioned difficulty. By introducing a novel treatment of the boundary condition and assigning appropriate slip velocities to the boundary particles, the SPD-squirmer model is able to accurately represent a range of microswimmer types including pushers, neutral swimmers, and pullers. We systematically validate the steady-state velocity of the squirmer, the resulting flow field, its hydrodynamic interactions with the surrounding environment, and the mutual collision of two squirmers. In the presence of Brownian motion, the model is also able to correctly calculate the velocity and angular velocity autocorrelation functions at the mesoscale. Finally, we simulate a squirmer within a multiphase flow by considering a droplet that encloses a squirmer and imposing a surface tension between the two flow phases. We find that the squirmer within the droplet exhibits different motion types.
title Simulating squirmers with smoothed particle dynamics
topic Fluid Dynamics
Soft Condensed Matter
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2411.13893