Hamiltonian traffic dynamics in microfluidic-loop networks

TL;DR

This paper demonstrates that particles in microfluidic loop networks exhibit Hamiltonian dynamics and reciprocal trajectories, revealing fundamental insights into hydrodynamic interactions in complex fluidic systems.

Contribution

It uncovers Hamiltonian behavior and reciprocal trajectories in particle transport within microfluidic loops, combining experiments, theory, and simulations.

Findings

Particles follow Hamiltonian dynamics in microfluidic loops

Trajectories are reciprocal despite broken microscopic symmetry

Effective three-particle interactions are characterized

Abstract

Recent microfluidic experiments revealed that large particles advected in a fluidic loop display long-range hydrodynamic interactions. However, the consequences of such couplings on the traffic dynamics in more complex networks remain poorly understood. In this letter, we focus on the transport of a finite number of particles in one-dimensional loop networks. By combining numerical, theoretical, and experimental efforts, we evidence that this collective process offers a unique example of Hamiltonian dynamics for hydrodynamically interacting particles. In addition, we show that the asymptotic trajectories are necessarily reciprocal despite the microscopic traffic rules explicitly break the time reversal symmetry. We exploit these two remarkable properties to account for the salient features of the effective three-particle interaction induced by the exploration of fluidic loops.