Giant vortex dynamics in confined active turbulence

Abstract

We report the numerical evidence of a new state of active turbulence in confined domains. By means of extensive numerical simulations of the Toner-Tu-Swift-Hohenberg model for dense bacterial suspensions in circular geometry, we discover the formation a stable, ordered state in which the angular momentum symmetry is broken. This is achieved by self-organization of a turbulent-like flow into a single, giant vortex of the size of the domain. The giant vortex is surrounded by an annular region close to the boundary, characterized by small-scale, radial vorticity streaks. The average radial velocity profile of the vortex is found to be in agreement with a simple analytical prediction. We also provide an estimate of the temporal and spatial scales of a suitable experimental setup comparable with our numerical findings.

5 pages, 4 figures

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Cited by in corpus (7)

• Intermittency, fluctuations and maximal chaos in an emergent universal state of active turbulence
• Onset of Intermittency and Multiscaling in Active Turbulence
• Flocking turbulence of microswimmers in confined domains
• Oscillating edge current in polar active fluid
• Emergence of Local Ordering and Mesoscale Giant Number Fluctuations in Active Turbulence
• Cascades and Kolmogorov's lognormal scaling in two-dimensional bacterial turbulence
• Geometric frustration and pairing order transition in confined bacterial vortices