Dresden 2020 – scientific programme

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DY: Fachverband Dynamik und Statistische Physik

DY 54: Poster: Active Matter and Microswimmers (joint session DY/TT)

DY 54.2: Poster

Thursday, March 19, 2020, 15:00–18:00, P1A

Inertial effects in collective microswimmer hydrodynamics — •Jan Cammann and Michael Wilczek — Max Planck Institute for Dynamics and Self-Organization, Göttingen

Microswimmers, such as bacteria, sperm cells, and motile algae, are typically found in regimes where the relevant length and velocity scales allow their hydrodynamic interactions to be studied in the limit of low Reynolds numbers. This simplifies the Navier-Stokes to the Stokes equations. In this approximation, inertial effects are completely neglected. For individual swimmers, this approximation is known to work well, whereas for the collective motion of a large number of swimmers the situation is less clear. For dense suspensions, the hydrodynamic flows produced by the individuals may interfere constructively, making inertial effects relevant. To elucidate this, we perform direct numerical simulations of swimmers immersed in a fluid described by either the Navier-Stokes or the Stokes equations. By directly comparing the dynamical properties, we probe the limits of this approximation for the collective hydrodynamics.