Abstract
We use continuum simulations to study the impact of friction on the ordering of defects in an active nematic. Even in a frictionless system, defects tend to align side by side and orient antiparallel reflecting their propensity to form, and circulate with, flow vortices. Increasing friction enhances the effectiveness of the defect-defect interactions, and defects form dynamically evolving, large-scale, positionally, and orientationally ordered structures, which can be explained as a competition between hexagonal packing, preferred by the defects, and rectangular packing, preferred by the defects.
- Received 3 May 2020
- Revised 30 July 2020
- Accepted 22 October 2020
DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevLett.125.218004
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