title: Bimetallic Microswimmers Speed Up in Confining Channels.
abstract: Synthetic microswimmers are envisioned to be useful in numerous applications, many of which occur in tightly confined spaces. It is therefore important to understand how confinement influences swimmer dynamics. Here we study the motility of bimetallic microswimmers in linear and curved channels. Our experiments show swimmer velocities increase, up to 5 times, with the degree of confinement, and the relative velocity increase depends weakly on the fuel concentration and ionic strength in solution. Experimental results are reproduced in a numerical model which attributes the swimmer velocity increase to electrostatic and electrohydrodynamic boundary effects. Our work not only helps to elucidate the confinement effect of phoretic swimmers, but also suggests that spatial confinement may be used as an effective control method for them.
authors.affiliation: Department of Physics and Astronomy and Institute of Natural Sciences, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, Shanghai 200240, China.
authors.forename: Chang
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Liu
authors.affiliation: School of Material Science and Engineering, Harbin Institute of Technology, Shenzhen Graduate School, Shenzhen 518055, China.
authors.forename: Chao
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Zhou
authors.affiliation: School of Material Science and Engineering, Harbin Institute of Technology, Shenzhen Graduate School, Shenzhen 518055, China.|Center for Soft and Living Matter, Institute for Basic Science (IBS), Ulsan 44919, Republic of Korea.
authors.forename: Wei
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: Wang
authors.affiliation: Department of Physics and Astronomy and Institute of Natural Sciences, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, Shanghai 200240, China.|Collaborative Innovation Center of Advanced Microstructures, Nanjing 210093, China.
authors.forename: H P
authors.initials: HP
authors.lastname: Zhang
mesh_terms: D002465:Cell Movement; D003198:Computer Simulation; D008670:Metals; D008954:Models, Biological; D013550:Swimming
chemical_list: D008670:Metals