Dynamics of a treadmilling microswimmer near a no-slip wall in simple shear

Abstract

Induction of flow is commonly used to control the migration of a microswimmer in a confined system such as a microchannel. The motion of a swimmer, in general, is governed by nonlinear equations due to non-trivial hydrodynamic interactions between the flow and the swimmer near a wall. This paper derives analytical expressions for the equations of motion governing a circular treadmilling swimmer in simple shear near a no-slip wall by combining the reciprocal theorem for Stokes flow with an exact solution for the dragging problem of a cylinder near a wall. We demonstrate that the reduced dynamical system possesses a Hamiltonian structure, which we use to show that the swimmer cannot migrate stably at a constant distance from a wall but only exhibit periodic oscillatory motion along the wall, or to escape from it. A treadmilling swimmer with the lowest two treadmilling modes is investigated in detail by means of a bifurcation analysis of the reduced dynamical system. It is found that the swimming direction of oscillatory motion is clarified by the sign of the Hamiltonian in the absence of flow, and that the induction of the flow suppresses upstream migration but aligns swimmer orientations in downstream migration. These results could inform strategies for the transport and control of micro-organisms and micromachines.