Paramagnetism in spherically confined charged active matter
The celebrated theorem of Bohr and van Leeuwen guarantees that a classical charged system cannot have a magnetization in thermal equilibrium. Quantum mechanically, however, a response is obtained. In contrast, we show here that a classical charged active system, consisting of a motile particle confined to the surface of a sphere, has a nonzero magnetization and a response. We numerically sample Langevin trajectories of this system and compare with limiting analytical solutions of the Fokker-Planck equation, at small and large temperatures, to find excellent agreement in the magnetic response. Our Letter suggests experimental routes to controlling and extracting work from charged active matter.
Publication Details
- Journal
- Apollo (University of Cambridge)
- Published
- 2025-05-22
- DOI
- https://doi.org/10.17863/cam.118423
- Primary Topic
- Micro and Nano Robotics
- Type
- article
- Field-Weighted Citation Impact
- 0.00