We demonstrate that it is possible to realize vortex ice states that are analogous to square and kagome ice. With numerical simulations, we show that the system can be brought into a state that obeys either global or local ice rules by applying an external current according to an annealing protocol. We explore the breakdown of the ice rules due to disorder in the nanostructure array and show that in square ice, topological defects appear along grain boundaries, while in kagome ice, individual defects appear. We argue that the vortex system offers significant advantages over other artificial ice systems.
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We study the topological configurations and dynamics of individual point defect vacancies and interstitials in a two-dimensional crystal of colloids interacting via a repulsive Yukawa potential. Our Brownian dynamics simulations show that the diffusion mechanism for vacancy defects occurs in two phases. The defect can glide along the crystal lattice directions, and it can rotate during an excited topological transition configuration to assume a different direction for the next period of gliding. The results for the vacancy defects are in good agreement with recent experiments. For interstitial point defects, which were not studied in the experiments, we find several of the same modes of motion as in the vacancy defect case along with two additional diffusion pathways. The interstitial defects are more mobile than the vacancy defects due to the more two-dimensional nature of the diffusion of the interstitial defects.
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We show that a rich variety of dynamic phases can be realized for mono-and bidisperse mixtures of interacting colloids under the influence of a symmetric flashing periodic substrate. With the addition of dc or ac drives, phase locking, jamming, and new types of ratchet effects occur. In some regimes we find that the addition of a nonratcheting species increases the velocity of the ratcheting particles. We show that these effects occur due to the collective interactions of the colloids.
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We show that in colloidal models of artificial kagome and modified square ice systems, a variety of ordering and disordering regimes occurs as a function of the biasing field, temperature and colloid–colloid interaction strength, including ordered monopole crystals, biased ice rule states, thermally induced ice-rule ground states, biased triple states and disordered states. We describe the lattice geometries and biasing field protocols that create the different states and explain the formation of the states in terms of sublattice switching thresholds. For a system prepared in a monopole lattice state, we show that a sequence of different orderings occurs for increasing temperature. Our results also explain several features observed in nanomagnetic artificial ice systems under an applied field. Read More

Using computer simulations, we investigate hysteresis loops and return-point memory for artificial square and kagome spin ice systems by cycling an applied bias force and comparing microscopic effective spin configurations throughout the hysteresis cycle. Return-point memory loss is caused by motion of individual defects in kagome ice or of grain boundaries in square ice. In successive cycles, return-point memory is recovered rapidly in kagome ice. Memory is recovered more gradually in square ice due to the extended nature of the grain boundaries. Increasing the amount of quenched disorder increases the defect density but also enhances the return-point memory since the defects become trapped more easily.
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Depinning and nonequilibrium transitions within sliding states in systems driven over quenched disorder arise across a wide spectrum of size scales ranging from atomic friction at the nanoscale, flux motion in type II superconductors at the mesoscale, colloidal motion in disordered media at the microscale, and plate tectonics at geological length scales. Here we show that active matter or self-propelled particles interacting with quenched disorder under an external drive represents a class of system that can also exhibit pinning-depinning phenomena, plastic flow phases, and nonequilibrium sliding transitions that are correlated with distinct morphologies and velocity-force curve signatures. When interactions with the substrate are strong, a homogeneous pinned liquid phase forms that depins plastically into a uniform disordered phase and then dynamically transitions first into a moving stripe coexisting with a pinned …
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We investigate the effect of a deliberately introduced shape asymmetry on magnetization reversal in small, square-shaped, magnetic rings. The magnetization reversal process is investigated using the diffracted magneto-optical Kerr effect combined with micromagnetic simulations. Experimentally we find that the reversal path is sensitive to small (±1°) changes in the direction of the applied field. Micromagnetic simulations that reproduce the measured zeroth- and first-order loops allow us to identify the reversal mechanisms as due to different intermediate states, namely, the so-called vortex and horseshoe states. Based on our results we are now able to prescribe a methodology for writing a vortex state with specific chirality in these asymmetric rings. Such control will be necessary if patterned arrays of this kind are to be used as magnetic storage elements.
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Jamming describes a transition from a flowing or liquid state to a solid or rigid state in a loose assembly of particles such as grains or bubbles. In contrast, clogging describes the ceasing of the flow of particulate matter through a bottleneck. It is not clear how to distinguish jamming from clogging, nor is it known whether they are distinct phenomena or fundamentally the same. We examine an assembly of disks moving through a random obstacle array and identify a transition from clogging to jamming behavior as the disk density increases. The clogging transition has characteristics of an absorbing phase transition, with the disks evolving into a heterogeneous phase-separated clogged state after a critical diverging transient time. In contrast, jamming is a rapid process in which the disks form a homogeneous motionless packing, with a rigidity length scale that diverges as the jamming density is approached.
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Using numerical simulations we study the configurations, dynamics, and thermal depinning properties of vortex lattices interacting with elliptical pinning sites at integer matching fields with as many as 27 vortices per pin. Our pinning model is based on a recently produced experimental system [G. Karapetrov et al., Phys. Rev. Lett. 95, 167002 (2005)], and the vortex configurations we obtain match well with experimental vortex images from the same system. We find that the strong pinning sites capture more than one vortex each and that the saturation number of vortices residing in a pin increases with applied field due to the pressure from the surrounding vortices. At high matching fields, the vortices in the interstitial regions form a disordered triangular lattice. We measure the depinning thresholds for both the x and y directions, and find distinctive dynamical responses along with highly anisotropic thresholds. For …
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