Dancing magnetic bacteria, cubes and spheres

Orateur : Leon ABELMANN (KIST Europe, Germany)

Since magnetic fields are not hampered by most fluids, it is very easy to control objects in fluids by magnetic forces. We will give two examples. In the first project, we control magneto-tactic bacteria inside microfluidic chips. We made them dance, and analyzed and modelled the way in which they react to a rotatin g external field. The knowledge obtained can be applied to magnetically steered, self-propelled microrobots for instance. In the second project, we demonstrate three-dimensional self-assembly using magnetic interaction forces. We do this on the micrometer scale with silicon cubes inside a paramagnetic fluid, and on the centimeter scale with 3D printed objects with embedded magnets. By increasing the size of the objects to such big dimensions, we enable three-dimensional observation at high time resolution. This allowed us to demonstrate fundamental thermodynamical principles, such as Maxwell-Boltzman statistics and the Einstein relation. From the experiments on the macroscale, we hope to learn about more practical applications of self-assembly on the microscale.

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