Kemgang E, Messina R. Columnar dipolar clusters defying gravity.
Phys Rev E 2022;
105:L012602. [PMID:
35193270 DOI:
10.1103/physreve.105.l012602]
[Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 06/07/2021] [Accepted: 12/24/2021] [Indexed: 06/14/2023]
Abstract
A striking and highly versatile feature of magnetic (nano)particles is their ability to be manipulated at will at a distance by external fields. In this paper, the influence of gravity on the self-assembly of dipolar particles near a surface in the presence of a strong vertical magnetic field is investigated theoretically. A rich ground-state phase diagram stems from the effects of the number of particles N and gravity. Two distinct regimes are discovered for the gravity-mediated breakup of a standing chain. When N is small, there is a chain fragmentation (with two widely separated repulsive chain fragments) above a critical value for the gravity, whereas for higher chains, ribbonization (with two cohesive chain fragments) sets in. In both scenarios, simple algebraic decays for the transition gravity as a function of N are analytically predicted and accurately corroborate the exact numerical results. Further intricate chain fragmentations and internal ribbon transformations operate upon further increasing the gravity until all N constitutive particles lie on the surface. Our findings shed additional light on various recent experiments and computer simulations on magnetic colloids and granular media.
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