# Publications

## Classical dimers on penrose tilings

Physical Review X American Physical Society 10 (2020) 011005

SH Simon, F Flicker

## Transport in bilayer graphene near charge neutrality: Which scattering mechanisms are important?

Physical Review Letters American Physical Society 124 (2020) 026601

G Wagner, DX Nguyen, S Simon

## Self-consistent time-dependent harmonic approximation for the sine-Gordon model out of equilibrium

Journal of Statistical Mechanics: Theory and Experiment IOP Publishing 2019 (2019) 084012

Y Van Nieuwkerk, FHL Essler

We derive a self-consistent time-dependent harmonic approximation for the quantum sine-Gordon model out of equilibrium and apply the method to the dynamics of tunnel-coupled one-dimensional Bose gases. We determine the time evolution of experimentally relevant observables and in particular derive results for the probability distribution of subsystem phase fluctuations. We investigate the regime of validity of the approximation by applying it to the simpler case of a nonlinear harmonic oscillator, for which numerically exact results are available. We complement our self-consistent harmonic approximation by exact results at the free fermion point of the sine-Gordon model.

## Superconducting order of Sr2RuO4 from a three-dimensional microscopic model

Physical Review Research American Physical Society 1 (2019) 033108

H Roising, S Simon, T Scaffidi, F Flicker, G Lange

## Driven quantum dot coupled to a fractional quantum Hall edge

Physical Review B: Condensed Matter and Materials Physics American Physical Society 100 (2019) 245111

DL Kovrizhin, S Simon, G Wagner, DX Nguyen

## Free fermions in disguise

Journal of Physics A: Mathematical and Theoretical IOP Science (2019)

P Fendley

I solve a quantum chain whose Hamiltonian is comprised solely of local four-fermi operators by constructing free-fermion raising and lowering operators. The free-fermion operators are both non-local and highly non-linear in the local fermions. This construction yields the complete spectrum of the Hamiltonian and an associated classical transfer matrix. The spatially uniform system is gapless with dynamical critical exponent z=3/2, while staggering the couplings gives a more conventional free-fermion model with an Ising transition. The Hamiltonian is equivalent to that of a spin-1/2 chain with next-nearest-neighbour interactions, and has a supersymmetry generated by a sum of fermion trilinears. The supercharges are part of a large non-abelian symmetry algebra that results in exponentially large degeneracies. The model is integrable for either open or periodic boundary conditions but the free-fermion construction only works for the former, while for the latter the extended symmetry is broken and the degeneracies split.

## Experimental observation of flow fields around active Janus spheres.

Nature communications 10 (2019) 3952-

AI Campbell, SJ Ebbens, P Illien, R Golestanian

The phoretic mechanisms at stake in the propulsion of asymmetric colloids have been the subject of debates during the past years. In particular, the importance of electrokinetic effects on the motility of Pt-PS Janus sphere was recently discussed. Here, we probe the hydrodynamic flow field around a catalytically active colloid using particle tracking velocimetry both in the freely swimming state and when kept stationary with an external force. Our measurements provide information about the fluid velocity in the vicinity of the surface of the colloid, and confirm a mechanism for propulsion that was proposed recently. In addition to offering a unified understanding of the nonequilibrium interfacial transport processes at stake, our results open the way to a thorough description of the hydrodynamic interactions between such active particles and understanding their collective dynamics.

## Erratum: Charge Transport in Weyl Semimetals (Physical Review Letters (2012) 108 (046602) DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevLett.108.046602)

Physical Review Letters 123 (2019)

P Hosur, SA Parameswaran, A Vishwanath

© 2019 American Physical Society. This erratum corrects errors in numerical factors in Eqs. (1), (7), and (8), and the overall scale of the dc resistivity plotted in Fig. 2. We recently discovered an algebraic error in Eq. (7), which led to incorrect numerical factors in Eqs. (1) and (8). The correct Eqs. (1), (7) and (8), respectively, are (Formula Presented). An error was also found in the overall scale of pdc = 1/σdc calculated from (1) and plotted in Fig. 2 of the Letter. With these corrections our theory underestimates ?dc of the samples in Ref. [12] of the Letter, which is understandable since the samples are polycrystalline while our theory specializes to single crystals. However, correcting both errors gives excellent agreement with recent experiments on Eu 0.96 Bi 0.04 Ir 2 O 7 [1] for reasonable values of parameters, as shown in Fig. 1. Moreover, Ref. [1] finds pdc ( T ) ∼ 1 / T , as predicted by our theory, only at low temperatures, which is where our theory is best applicable since it contains only Coulomb scattering but ignores phonon scattering. Thus, it is likely that the low-temperature transport in Eu 0.96 Bi 0.04 Ir 2 O 7 is dominated by Coulomb scattering. We thank Surjeet Singh and Prachi Telang for bringing the error in the computation of pdc to our attention (Figure Presented).

## Efficiency limits of the three-sphere swimmer

Physical Review Fluids 4 (2019)

B Nasouri, A Vilfan, R Golestanian

© 2019 American Physical Society. We consider a swimmer consisting of a collinear assembly of three spheres connected by two slender rods. This swimmer can propel itself forward by varying the lengths of the rods in a way that is not invariant under time reversal. Although any non-reciprocal strokes of the arms can lead to a net displacement, the energetic efficiency of the swimmer is strongly dependent on the details and sequences of these strokes, and also the sizes of the spheres. We define the efficiency of the swimmer using Lighthill's criterion, i.e., the power that is needed to pull the swimmer by an external force at a certain speed, divided by the power needed for active swimming with the same average speed. Here, we determine numerically the optimal stroke sequences and the optimal size ratio of the spheres, while limiting the maximum extension of the rods. Our calculation takes into account both far-field and near-field hydrodynamic interactions. We show that, surprisingly, the three-sphere swimmer with unequal spheres can be more efficient than the equally sized case. We also show that the variations of efficiency with size ratio is not monotonic and there exists a specific size ratio at which the swimmer has the highest efficiency. We find that the swimming efficiency initially rises by increasing the maximum allowable extension of the rods, and then converges to a maximum value. We calculate this upper limit analytically and report the highest value of efficiency that the three-sphere swimmer can reach.

## Topology and symmetry-protected domain wall conduction in quantum Hall nematics

Physical review B: Condensed matter and materials physics American Physical Society 100 (2019) 165103

K Agarwal, MT Randeria, A Yazdani, SL Sondhi, S Ashok Parameswaran

## Active phase separation in mixtures of chemically-interacting particles

EUROPEAN BIOPHYSICS JOURNAL WITH BIOPHYSICS LETTERS 48 (2019) S66-S66

J Agudo-Canalejo, R Golestanian

## Sustained Oscillations of Epithelial Cell Sheets.

Biophysical journal 117 (2019) 464-478

G Peyret, R Mueller, J d'Alessandro, S Begnaud, P Marcq, R-M Mège, JM Yeomans, A Doostmohammadi, B Ladoux

Morphological changes during development, tissue repair, and disease largely rely on coordinated cell movements and are controlled by the tissue environment. Epithelial cell sheets are often subjected to large-scale deformation during tissue formation. The active mechanical environment in which epithelial cells operate have the ability to promote collective oscillations, but how these cellular movements are generated and relate to collective migration remains unclear. Here, combining in vitro experiments and computational modeling, we describe a form of collective oscillations in confined epithelial tissues in which the oscillatory motion is the dominant contribution to the cellular movements. We show that epithelial cells exhibit large-scale coherent oscillations when constrained within micropatterns of varying shapes and sizes and that their period and amplitude are set by the smallest confinement dimension. Using molecular perturbations, we then demonstrate that force transmission at cell-cell junctions and its coupling to cell polarity are pivotal for the generation of these collective movements. We find that the resulting tissue deformations are sufficient to trigger osillatory mechanotransduction of YAP within cells, potentially affecting a wide range of cellular processes.

## Quantum Brownian motion in a quasiperiodic potential

Physical review B: Condensed matter and materials physics American Physical Society 100 (2019) 060301

A Friedman, R Vasseur, A Lamacraft, S Ashok Parameswaran

We consider a quantum particle subject to Ohmic dissipation, moving in a bichromatic quasiperiodic potential. In a periodic potential the particle undergoes a zero-temperature localization-delocalization transition as dissipation strength is decreased. We show that the delocalized phase is absent in the quasiperiodic case, even when the deviation from periodicity is infinitesimal. Using the renormalization group, we determine how the effective localization length depends on the dissipation. We show that a similar problem can emerge in the strong-coupling limit of a mobile impurity moving in a periodic lattice and immersed in a one-dimensional quantum gas.

## Controlling collective rotational patterns of magnetic rotors

Nature Communications Springer Nature 10 (2019) 4696

D Matsunaga, JK Hamilton, F Meng, J Yeomans, R Golestanian

## Active matter invasion.

Soft matter (2019)

F Kempf, R Mueller, E Frey, JM Yeomans, A Doostmohammadi

Biologically active materials such as bacterial biofilms and eukaryotic cells thrive in confined micro-spaces. Here, we show through numerical simulations that confinement can serve as a mechanical guidance to achieve distinct modes of collective invasion when combined with growth dynamics and the intrinsic activity of biological materials. We assess the dynamics of the growing interface and classify these collective modes of invasion based on the activity of the constituent particles of the growing matter. While at small and moderate activities the active material grows as a coherent unit, we find that blobs of active material collectively detach from the cohort above a well-defined activity threshold. We further characterise the mechanical mechanisms underlying the crossovers between different modes of invasion and quantify their impact on the overall invasion speed.

## Topology and Morphology of Self-Deforming Active Shells.

Physical review letters 123 (2019) 208001-208001

L Metselaar, JM Yeomans, A Doostmohammadi

We present a generic framework for modeling three-dimensional deformable shells of active matter that captures the orientational dynamics of the active particles and hydrodynamic interactions on the shell and with the surrounding environment. We find that the cross talk between the self-induced flows of active particles and dynamic reshaping of the shell can result in conformations that are tunable by varying the form and magnitude of active stresses. We further demonstrate and explain how self-induced topological defects in the active layer can direct the morphodynamics of the shell. These findings are relevant to understanding morphological changes during organ development and the design of bioinspired materials that are capable of self-organization.

## Dynamics of individual Brownian rods in a microchannel flow

Soft Matter Royal Society of Chemistry 15 (2019) 5810-5814

AZ Zöttl, K Klop, A Balin, Y Gao, D Aarts, J Yeomans

We study the orientational dynamics of heavy silica microrods flowing through a microfluidic channel. Comparing experiments and Brownian dynamics simulations we identify different particle orbits, in particular in-plane tumbling behavior, which cannot be explained by classical Jeffery theory, and we relate this behavior to the rotational diffusion of the rods. By constructing the full, three-dimensional, orientation distribution, we describe the rod trajectories and quantify the persistence of Jeffery orbits using temporal correlation functions of the Jeffery constant. We find that our colloidal rods lose memory of their initial configuration in about a second, corresponding to half a Jeffery period.

## Bose-Einstein-like condensation in scalar active matter with diffusivity edge.

Physical review. E 100 (2019) 010601-

R Golestanian

Due to their remarkable properties, systems that exhibit self-organization of their components resulting from intrinsic microscopic activity have been extensively studied in the last two decades. In a generic class of active matter, the interactions between the active components are represented via an effective density-dependent diffusivity in a mean-field single-particle description. Here, a class of scalar active matter is proposed by incorporating a diffusivity edge into the dynamics: when the local density of the system surpasses a critical threshold, the diffusivity vanishes. The effect of the diffusivity edge is studied under the influence of an external potential, which introduces the ability to control the behavior of the system by changing an effective temperature, which is defined in terms of the single-particle diffusivity and mobility. At a critical effective temperature, a system that is trapped by a harmonic potential is found to undergo a condensation transition, which manifests formal similarities to Bose-Einstein condensation.

## Signatures of information scrambling in the dynamics of the entanglement spectrum

Physical review B: Condensed Matter and Materials Physics American Physical Sociey (2019)

T Rakovsky, S Gopalakrishnan, S Ashok Parameswaran, F Pollmann

We examine the time evolution of the entanglement spectrum of a small subsystem of a nonintegrable spin chain following a quench from a product state. We identify signatures in this entanglement spectrum of the distinct dynamical velocities (related to entanglement and operator spreading) that control thermalization. We show that the onset of level repulsion in the entanglement spectrum occurs on different timescales depending on the “entanglement energy”, and that this dependence reflects the shape of the operator front. Level repulsion spreads across the entire entanglement spectrum on a timescale that is parametrically shorter than that for full thermalization of the subsystem. This timescale is also close to when the mutual information between individual spins at the ends of the subsystem reaches its maximum. We provide an analytical understanding of this phenomenon and show supporting numerical data for both random unitary circuits and a microscopic Hamiltonian.

## Spectral statistics and many-body quantum chaos with conserved charge

Phys. Rev. Lett. 123 (2019) 210603-210603

AJ Friedman, A Chan, AD Luca, JT Chalker

We investigate spectral statistics in spatially extended, chaotic many-body quantum systems with a conserved charge. We compute the spectral form factor $K(t)$ analytically for a minimal Floquet circuit model that has a $U(1)$ symmetry encoded via auxiliary spin-$1/2$ degrees of freedom. Averaging over an ensemble of realizations, we relate $K(t)$ to a partition function for the spins, given by a Trotterization of the spin-$1/2$ Heisenberg ferromagnet. Using Bethe Ansatz techniques, we extract the 'Thouless time' $t^{\vphantom{*}}_{\rm Th}$ demarcating the extent of random matrix behavior, and find scaling behavior governed by diffusion for $K(t)$ at $t\lesssim t^{\vphantom{*}}_{\rm Th}$. We also report numerical results for $K(t)$ in a generic Floquet spin model, which are consistent with these analytic predictions.