Braiding a Flock: Winding Statistics of Interacting Flying Spins

作者:Caussin Jean Baptiste*; Bartolo Denis
来源:Physical Review Letters, 2015, 114(25): 258101.
DOI:10.1103/PhysRevLett.114.258101

摘要

When animal groups move coherently in the form of a flock, their trajectories are not all parallel, the individuals exchange their position in the group. In this Letter, we introduce a measure of this mixing dynamics, which we quantify as the winding of the braid formed from the particle trajectories. Building on a paradigmatic flocking model we numerically and theoretically explain the winding statistics and show that it is predominantly set by the global twist of the trajectories as a consequence of a spontaneous symmetry breaking.

  • 出版日期2015-6-23