Swimmers at interfaces enhance interfacial transport

Abstract

The behavior of fluid interfaces far from equilibrium plays central roles in nature and in industry. Active swimmers trapped at interfaces can alter transport at fluid boundaries with far reaching implications. Swimmers can become trapped at interfaces in diverse configurations and swim persistently in these surface adhered states. The self-propelled motion of bacteria makes them ideal model swimmers to understand such effects. We have recently characterized the swimming of interfacially trapped Pseudomonas aeruginosa PA01 moving in pusher mode. The swimmers adsorb at the interface with pinned contact lines, which fix the angle of the cell body at the interface and constrain their motion. Thus, swimmers become trapped at interfaces in diverse configurations and swim persistently in these surface adhered states. We observe that most interfacially trapped bacteria swim along circular paths. Fluid interfaces also typically form incompressible two-dimensional layers. These effects influence the flow generated by the swimmers. In our previous work, we have visualized the interfacial flow around a pusher bacterium and described the flow field using two dipolar hydrodynamic modes; one stresslet mode whose symmetries differ from those in bulk, and another bulk mode unique to incompressible fluid interfaces. Based on this understanding, swimmer-induced tracer displacements and swimmer–swimmer pair interactions are explored using analysis and experiment. The settings in which multiple interfacial swimmers with circular motion can significantly enhance interfacial transport of tracers or promote mixing of other swimmers on the interface are identified through simulations and compared to experiment. This study shows the importance of biomixing by swimmers at fluid interfaces and identifies important factors in the design of biomimetic active colloids to enhance interfacial transport.