title: Confined Catalytic Janus Swimmers in a Crowded Channel: Geometry-Driven Rectification Transients and Directional Locking.
abstract: Self-propelled Janus particles, acting as microscopic vehicles, have the potential to perform complex tasks on a microscopic scale, suitable, e.g., for environmental applications, on-chip chemical information processing, or in vivo drug delivery. Development of these smart nanodevices requires a better understanding of how synthetic swimmers move in crowded and confined environments that mimic actual biosystems, e.g., network of blood vessels. Here, the dynamics of self-propelled Janus particles interacting with catalytically passive silica beads in a narrow channel is studied both experimentally and through numerical simulations. Upon varying the area density of the silica beads and the width of the channel, active transport reveals a number of intriguing properties, which range from distinct bulk and boundary-free diffusivity at low densities, to directional "locking" and channel "unclogging" at higher densities, whereby a Janus swimmer is capable of transporting large clusters of passive particles.
authors.affiliation: Institute for Materials Science and Max Bergmann Center of Biomaterials, Dresden University of Technology, 01062, Dresden, Germany.
authors.forename: Hailing
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Yu
authors.affiliation: Institute for Materials Science and Max Bergmann Center of Biomaterials, Dresden University of Technology, 01062, Dresden, Germany.
authors.forename: Andrii
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Kopach
authors.affiliation: Departement Fysica, Universiteit Antwerpen, B-2020, Antwerpen, Belgium.|CEMS, RIKEN, Saitama, 351-0198, Japan.
authors.forename: Vyacheslav R
authors.initials: VR
authors.lastname: Misko
authors.affiliation: Departement Fysica, Universiteit Antwerpen, B-2020, Antwerpen, Belgium.
authors.forename: Anna A
authors.initials: AA
authors.lastname: Vasylenko
authors.affiliation: Helmholtz-Zentrum Dresden-Rossendorf e.V, 01314, Dresden, Germany.
authors.forename: Denys
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Makarov
authors.affiliation: CEMS, RIKEN, Saitama, 351-0198, Japan.|Center for Phononics and Thermal Energy Science, School of Physics Science and Engineering, Tongji University, Shanghai, 200092, China.
authors.forename: Fabio
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Marchesoni
authors.affiliation: CEMS, RIKEN, Saitama, 351-0198, Japan.|Physics Department, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI, 48109-1040, USA.
authors.forename: Franco
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Nori
authors.affiliation: Institute for Materials Science and Max Bergmann Center of Biomaterials, Dresden University of Technology, 01062, Dresden, Germany.|Center of Advancing Electronics Dresden cfaed, Dresden, Germany.
authors.forename: Larysa
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Baraban
authors.affiliation: Institute for Materials Science and Max Bergmann Center of Biomaterials, Dresden University of Technology, 01062, Dresden, Germany.|Center of Advancing Electronics Dresden cfaed, Dresden, Germany.
authors.forename: Gianaurelio
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Cuniberti
keywords: Janus particles motors; catalytic propulsion; microfluidic channels; microswimmers