Using a stochastic kinetic theory to understand collective behavior of swimming microorganisms
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Authors
Qian, Yuzhou
Issue Date
2017-08
Type
Electronic thesis
Thesis
Thesis
Language
ENG
Keywords
Chemical engineering
Alternative Title
Abstract
This thesis gives a brief review on both categories of theories and then mainly focuses on one specific extended continuous field theory. This stochastic field theory which we are going to present overcomes a few disadvantages of the classic field theories, bridges the two kinds of mentioned models and provides more realistic analytical calculations and simulation results of the group behaviors. In detail, by including stochastic fluxes, we quantify the dynamics in terms of enhanced diffusion and mixing, spatial and temporal correlations of the fluid-related quantities and micro-swimmer population fluctuations in dilute systems. Later, we explore the tracer diffusivity by connecting Eulerian correlations and the Lagrangian correlations at low Kubo number. Meanwhile, we also compare the results with the mean field theory, discrete particle-based simulations and the experiments. In the end, we use a finite difference method to simulate the nonlinear dynamics and compare them with the linear one.
Description
August 2017
School of Engineering
School of Engineering
Full Citation
Publisher
Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, Troy, NY