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Viscous constraints on microorganism approach and interaction

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  31 July 2018

Mehdi Jabbarzadeh Open the ORCID record for Mehdi Jabbarzadeh [Opens in a new window]  and
Henry Chien Fu
Mehdi Jabbarzadeh
Affiliation:
Department of Mechanical Engineering, University of Utah, Salt Lake City, UT 84112, USA
Henry Chien Fu*
Affiliation:
Department of Mechanical Engineering, University of Utah, Salt Lake City, UT 84112, USA
*
†Email address for correspondence: henry.fu@utah.edu
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Abstract

Microorganisms must approach other suspended organisms or particles in order to interact with them during a host of life processes including feeding and mating. Microorganisms live at low Reynolds number where viscosity dominates and strongly affects the hydrodynamics of swimmer and nearby cells and objects. Viscous hydrodynamics makes it difficult for two surfaces to approach closely at low Reynolds numbers. Nonetheless, it is observed that microorganisms in fluid are still able to approach closely enough to interact with each other or suspended particles. Here, we study how the physical constraints provided by viscous hydrodynamics affects the feasibility of direct approach of flagellated and ciliated microorganisms to targets of different sizes. We find that it is feasible for singly flagellated swimmers to approach targets that are the same size or bigger. On the other hand, for squirmers, the feasibility of approach depends on near-field flows that can be controlled by the details of their swimming strokes.

JFM classification

Biological Fluid Dynamics: Biological Fluid Dynamics Biological Fluid Dynamics: Micro-organism dynamics Biological Fluid Dynamics: Swimming/flying

Information

Type
JFM Papers
Information
Journal of Fluid Mechanics , Volume 851 , 25 September 2018 , pp. 715 - 738
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Copyright
© 2018 Cambridge University Press 

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