QLS guest seminar - Wednesday, 9 October

[Quantitative Life Sciences]

	QLS Guest Seminar - Wednesday, 9 October 11h00am

ICTP, Central Area, 2nd floor, SISSA Building, via Beirut 2

Speaker: Etienne Fodor - DAMTP, Centre for Mathematical Sciences, 
University of Cambridge, UK

Title: Active matter far from equilibrium: Work, dissipation and phase 
transitions

Abstract:
Active matter is a paradigm of soft materials made of a large number of 
interacting agents, ranging from colonies of bacteria to assemblies of 
biomimetic micro-swimmers, where individual self-propulsion leads to 
dynamics and structures without any equilibrium equivalent. The 
dissipation at the basis of activity offers the opportunity to design 
smart materials, for instance to extract work with unprecedented 
protocols, for which generic guiding principles are still lacking. 
Moreover, controlling dissipation allows one to select which order 
emerges at large scale by promoting dynamical phase transitions, whose 
properties are yet to be studied.

First, I will present design strategies for active engines which exploit 
specifically nonequilibrium effects, such as the autonomous motion of 
asymmetric obstacles and the lack of an equation of state in active 
fluids. I will discuss how to optimize their efficiency in terms of the 
protocol details and, when possible, compare their performances with 
thermal engines. Second, I will examine the emergence of spontaneous 
order when changing dissipation. Using large deviation techniques, I 
will describe unexpected phase transitions, for instance towards a 
collective motion despite the lack of aligning interactions, and 
rationalize the microscopic mechanisms triggering such collective effects.

Indico: http://indico.ictp.it/event/9138/


Everyone interested is most welcome to attend!

-- 
Erica Sarnataro
Group Secretary
Quantitative Life Sciences
The Abdus Salam International Centre for Theoretical Physics (ICTP)
Trieste,  Italy
Tel. +39-040-2240623
www.ictp.it/research/qls.aspx
e-mail:qls at ictp.it