The directed transport of Brownian particles requires a system with an asymmetry and with non-equilibrium noise. We here investigate numerically alternative ways of fulfilling these requirements for a two-state Brownian motor, realised with Brownian particles alternating between two phase-shifted, symmetric potentials. We show that, besides the previously known spatio-temporal asymmetry based on unequal transfer rates between the potentials, inequalities in the potential depths, the frictions, or the equilibrium temperatures of the two potentials also generate the required asymmetry. We also show that the effects of the thermal noise and the noise of the transfer's randomness depend on the way the asymmetry is induced.
The rectification of noise into directed movement or useful energy is utilized by many different systems. The peculiar nature of the energy source and conceptual differences between such Brownian motor systems makes a characterization of the performance far from straightforward. In this work, where the Brownian motor consists of atoms interacting with dissipative optical lattices, we adopt existing theory and present experimental measurements for both the efficiency and the transport coherence. We achieve up to 0.3% for the efficiency and 0.01 for the Péclet number.
We have realized real-time steering of the directed transport in a Brownian motor based on cold atoms in optical lattices, and demonstrate drifts along pre-designed paths. The transport is induced by spatiotemporal asymmetries in the system, where we can control the spatial part, and we show that the response to changes in asymmetry is very fast. In addition to the directional steering, a real-time control of the magnitude of the average drift velocity and an on/off switching of the motor are also demonstrated. We use a non-invasive real-time detection of the transport, enabling a feedback con…
A model of an autonomous isothermal Brownian motor with an internal propulsion mechanism is considered. The motor is a Brownian particle which is semi-transparent for molecules of surrounding ideal gas. Molecular passage through the particle is controlled by a potential similar to that in the transition rate theory, i.e. characterized by two stationary states with a finite energy difference separated by a potential barrier. The internal potential drop maintains the diode-like asymmetry of molecular fluxes through the particle, which results in the particle's stationary drift.
We investigate the motion of a wedge-shaped object (a granular Brownian motor), which is restricted to move along the x-axis and cannot rotate, as gas particles collide with it. We show that its steady-state drift, resulting from inelastic gas-motor collisions, is dramatically affected by anisotropy in the velocity distribution of the gas. We identify the dimensionless parameter providing the dependence of this drift on shape, masses, inelasticity, and anisotropy: the anisotropy leads to a dramatic breaking of equipartition, which should easily be visible in experimental realizations.
We discuss an autonomous motor based on a Brownian particle driven from thermal equilibrium by periodic in time variation of the internal potential through which the particle interacts with molecules of the surrounding thermal bath. We demonstrate for such a motor the absence of a linear response regime: The average driving force and drift velocity are shown to be quadratic in both the frequency and amplitude of the variation. The adiabatic approximation (of an infinitely slow variation) and the leading correction to it (linear in the variation's frequency) both lead to zero drift and are insu…
We study transport properties of an inertial Brownian particle moving in viscous symmetric periodic structures and driven by an oscillating signal of two harmonic components. We analyze the influence of symmetric, antisymmetric and asymmetric signals on directed transport and reveal the shift symmetry of the stationary averaged velocity of the Brownian particle with respect to the relative phase of two components of the signal. The shift symmetry holds true in all regimes.
Emergence, optimization and stability of a motor-like motion in a fluctuating environment are analyzed. The emergence of motion is shown to be a general phenomenon. A motor converges to the state with the minimum of effective temperature and with the corresponding minimum in the rate of conformation changes similarly as some stochastic processes converge to the states with minimum diffusion activity. This mechanism is important to bacterial foraging (chemotaxis). This work, therefore, raises an analogy between chemotaxis and the emergence of living-like systems. The implications include the de…
Previous works have shown that time asymmetric forcing on the one hand, as well as non-Gaussian noises on the other, can separately enhance the efficiency and current of a Brownian motor. Here, we study the result of subjecting a Brownian motor to both effects simultaneously. Our results have been compared with those obtained for the Gaussian white noise regime in the adiabatic limit. We find that, although the inclusion of the time asymmetry parameter increases the efficiency value up to a certain extent, for the present case this increase is much less appreciable than in the white noise case…
We study fluctuating tilt Brownian ratchets based on fractional subdiffusion in sticky viscoelastic media characterized by a power law memory kernel. Unlike the normal diffusion case the rectification effect vanishes in the adiabatically slow modulation limit and optimizes in a driving frequency range. It is shown also that anomalous rectification effect is maximal (stochastic resonance effect) at optimal temperature and can exhibit a surprisingly good quality. Moreover, subdiffusive current can flow in the counter-intuitive direction upon a change of temperature or driving frequency. The depe…
A solvable model is proposed and analyzed to reveal the mechanism underlying the diffusion enhancement recently reported for a model of molecular motors and predicted to be observed in the biological rotary motor $\rm F_1$-ATPase. It turns out that the diffusion enhancement for the present model can approximately described by a random walk in which the waiting time for a step to occur is exponentially distributed and it takes nonzero time to proceed forward by the step. It is shown that the diffusion coefficient of such a random walk can significantly be increased when the average waiting time…
We consider the translationally invariant but parity (left-right symmetry) breaking Ising chain Hamiltonian \begin{equation} {\cal H} = -U_2\sum_{k} s_{k}s_{k+1} - U_3\sum_{k} s_{k}s_{k+1}s_{k+3} \nonumber \end{equation} and let this system evolve by Kawasaki spin exchange dynamics. Monte Carlo simulations show that perturbations forcing this system off equilibrium make it act as a Brownian molecular motor which, in the lattice gas interpretation, transports particles along the chain. We determine the particle current under various different circumstances, in particular as a function of the ra…
Human-created engines and evolutionarily optimized molecular motors exhibit sophisticated design in order to harvest chemical or thermal energy for generating unidirectional motion. The complexity of these motors makes their random emergence unlikely. Molecules capable of locomotion, however, seem to be essential to the creation of the first self-replicator and initiation of Darwinian evolution, posing a question of the physical mechanism that can facilitate emergence of directed motion in an isotropic environment. Here we show a universal thermodynamic mechanism for spontaneous emergence of m…
A molecular motor is made of either a single macromolecule or a macromolecular complex. Just like their macroscopic counterparts, molecular motors "transduce" input energy into mechanical work. All the nano-motors considered here operate under isothermal conditions far from equilibrium. Moreover, one of the possible mechanisms of energy transduction, called Brownian ratchet, does not even have any macroscopic counterpart. But, molecular motor is not synonymous with Brownian ratchet; a large number of molecular motors execute a noisy power stroke, rather than operating as Brownian ratchet. We r…
We study a noisy drive mechanism for efficiency enhancement of Brownian motors operating on the micro-scale domain. It was proven [J. Spiechowicz et al., J. Stat. Mech. P02044, (2013)] that biased noise $η(t)$ can induce normal and anomalous transport processes similar to those generated by a static force $F$ acting on inertial Brownian particles in a reflection-symmetric periodic structure in presence of symmetric unbiased time-periodic driving. Here, we show that within selected parameter regimes, noise $η(t)$ of the mean value $\langle η(t) \rangle = F$ can be significantly more effective t…
Examples of self propulsion in strongly fluctuating environment is abound in nature, e.g., molecular motors and pumps operating in living cells. Starting from Langevin equation of motion, we develop a fluctuating thermodynamic description of self propelled particles using simple models of velocity dependent forces. We derive fluctuation theorems for entropy production and a modified fluctuation dissipation relation, characterizing the linear response at non-equilibrium steady states. We study these notions in a simple model of molecular motors, and in the Rayleigh-Helmholtz and energy-depot mo…
We review a family of models recently introduced to describe Brownian motors under the influence of Coulomb friction, or more general non-linear friction laws. It is known that, if the heat bath is modeled as the usual Langevin equation (linear viscosity plus white noise), additional non-linear friction forces are not sufficient to break detailed balance, i.e. cannot produce a motor effect. We discuss two possibile mechanisms to elude this problem. A first possibility, exploited in several models inspired to recent experiments, is to replace the heat bath's white noise by a ``collisional noise…
Facilitated movement of inertial Brownian motors driven by a load under an asymmetric potential
根据最近的工作[L。马丘拉湾Kostur，P. Talkner，J. Luczka，and P. Hanggi，Phys. Rev. Lett. 98，040601（2007）]，我们将惯性布朗马达的研究扩展到非对称势的情况。研究发现，在非对称势的存在下，会出现一些输运现象。在定制的参数范围内，存在两个最佳载荷值，在这两个最佳载荷值处，平均速度取其最大值，这意味着在这两个参数范围内，载荷可以促进输运。此外，当负载增加时，可以观察到多次电流反转的现象。
A reversal of the particle current in rocking Brownian motors was predicted more than 20 years ago; however, an experimental verification and a deeper insight into the underlying mechanisms remained elusive. Here, we investigate the high frequency behaviour of a rocking Brownian motor for charged nanoparticles based on electrostatic interactions in a 3D shaped nanofluidic slit and electro-osmotic forcing of the particles. A sub ms temporal and $\approx\,10\,$nm spatial resolution of the 60 nm gold spheres allows us to measure the time-resolved and frequency dependent evolution of the particle …
Properties of transport of molecular motors are investigated. A simplified model based on the concept of Brownian ratchets is applied. We analyze a stochastic equation of motion by means of numerical methods. The transport is systematically studied with respect to its energetic efficiency and quality expressed by an effective diffusion coefficient. We demonstrate the role of friction and non-equilibrium driving on the transport quantifiers and identify regions of a parameter space where motors are optimally transported.
The energetics of a Brownian heat engine and heat pump driven by position dependent temperature, known as the Büttiker-Landauer heat engine and heat pump, is investigated by numerical simulations of the inertial Langevin equation. We identify parameter values for optimal performance of the heat engine and heat pump. Our results qualitatively differ from approaches based on the overdamped model. The behavior of the heat engine and heat pump, in the linear response regime is examined under finite time conditions and we find that the efficiency is lower than that of an endoreversible engine worki…
Brownian motors and Feymann ratchets have been intensively studied in the past decades due to their significance to the foundation of statistical physics. In this work we propose a new type of Brownian motor, i.e., a self-driven motor that only utilizes the temperature difference inside and outside the motor. The motor is a container with asymmetric geometry; when filling of gas, directional motion occurs if its temperature is different from the environment. The essentially new mechanism is that the asymmetric geometry of the container may induce anisotropic thermalization, which results in a …
The Kinesin family of motor proteins are involved in a variety of cellular processes that transport materials and generate force. With recent advances in experimental techniques, such as optical tweezers which can probe individual molecules, there has been an increasing interest in understanding the mechanisms by which motor proteins convert chemical energy into mechanical work. Here we present a mathematical model for the chemistry and three dimensional mechanics of the Kinesin motor protein which captures many of the force dependent features of the motor. For the elasticity of the tether tha…
In this work we experimentally study the behavior of a freely-rotating asymmetric probe immersed in a vibrated granular medium. For a wide variety of vibration conditions the probe exhibits a steady rotation whose direction is constant with respect to the asymmetry. By changing the vibration amplitude and by filtering the noise in different frequency bands we show that the velocity of rotation does not depend only on the RMS acceleration $Γ$, but also on the amount of energy provided to two separate frequency bands which are revealed to be important for the dynamics of the granular medium: the…
In this work we experimentally study a granular rotor which is similar to the famous Smoluchowski-Feynman device and which consists of a rotor with four vanes immersed in a granular gas. Each side of the vanes can be composed of two different materials, creating a rotational asymmetry and turning the rotor into a ratchet. When the granular temperature is high, the rotor is in movement all the time, and its angular velocity distribution is well described by the Brownian Limit discussed in previous works. When the granular temperature is lowered considerably we enter the so-called Single Kick Li…
We develop a numerical algorithm for computing the effective drift and diffusivity of the steady-state behavior of an overdamped particle driven by a periodic potential whose amplitude is modulated in time by multiplicative noise and forced by additive Gaussian noise (the mathematical structure of a flashing Brownian motor). The numerical algorithm is based on a spectral decomposition of the solution to the Fokker-Planck equation with periodic boundary conditions and the cell problem which result from homogenization theory. We also show that the numerical method of Wang, Peskin, Elston (WPE, 2…
We explore the transport features of a Brownian particle that walks in a periodic ratchet potential that is coupled with a spatially varying temperature background. Since the viscous friction of the medium decreases as the temperature of the medium increases, any reasonable exploration regarding the thermodynamic features of the Brownian engine should take into account the role of temperature on the viscosity of the fluid. In this work, we study this effect of temperature by considering a viscous friction that decreases exponentially as the background temperature increases. Our result depicts …
We investigate directed thermal heat flux across 1D homogenous nonlinear lattices when no net thermal bias is present on average. A nonlinear lattice of Fermi-Pasta-Ulam-type or Lennard-Jones-type system is connected at both ends to thermal baths which are held at the same temperature on temporal average. We study two different modulations of the heat bath temperatures, namely: (i) a symmetric, harmonic ac-driving of temperature of one heat bath only and (ii) a harmonic mixing drive of temperature acting on both heat baths. While for case (i) an adiabatic result for the net heat transport can …
