Complex Trajectories of Confined Fibers in Viscous Flows

Abstract eng:
We study the trajectories of elongated objects transported in microfluidic Hele Shaw cells. The transverse confinement (and the resulting viscous friction on the particle), as well as lateral confinement (i.e. the presence of lateral walls), lead to complex trajectories that we characterize experimentally and numerically. We show that the fiber behaves as an oscillator and obtain a complete bifurcation diagram. We then study the effect of the particle asymmetry by considering L-shaped particles; in that case, there is a coupling between translation and rotation that leads to a reorientation of the particle. We show that this reorientation stabilizes the particle motion.

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