Can we exploit hydrodynamic instabilities to trigger an efficient, selective and spontaneous flow of encapsulated chemical information? One possible answer to this question is presented in this paper where cross-diffusion, which commonly characterizes compartmentalized dispersed systems, is shown to initiate buoyancy-driven hydrodynamic instabilities. A general theoretical framework allows us to predict and classify cross-diffusion-induced convection in two-layer stratifications under the action of the gravitational field. The related nonlinear dynamics is described by a cross-diffusion-convection (CDC) model where fickian diffusion is coupled to the Stokes equations. We identify two types of hydrodynamic modes (the negative cross-diffusion-driven convection, NCC, and the positive cross-diffusion-driven convection, PCC) corresponding to the sign of the cross-diffusion term dominating the system dynamics. We finally show how AOT water-in-oil reverse microemulsions are an ideal model system to confirm the general theory and to approach experimentally cross-diffusion-induced hydrodynamic scenarios.
CITATION STYLE
Budroni, M. A., Carballido-Landeira, J., Intiso, A., Lemaigre, L., De Wit, A., & Rossi, F. (2016). From microscopic compartmentalization to hydrodynamic patterns: New pathways for information transport. In Communications in Computer and Information Science (Vol. 587, pp. 171–183). Springer Verlag. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-32695-5_16
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