Year: 2026
Type: preprint
Abstract: The Vicsek model continues to be central in statistical physics studies of active matter, with major recent surprises such as the partial metastability of the famous Toner-Tu flocking phase. Here we report on the diversity of band patterns observed in its coexistence phase --some of them never observed before--, but we also argue that most disappear in the infinite-size limit, leaving nevertheless a different picture than anticipated previously. We finally show that these rather regular, globally ordered band configurations can be destroyed by a localized perturbation: the coexistence phase is also at least partially metastable, and thus must be, asymptotically, a disordered phase made of a variety of chaotically interacting traveling bands.
Source: arXiv (Cornell University)
Institutions: Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, Commissariat à l'Énergie Atomique et aux Énergies Alternatives, Université Paris-Saclay, CEA Paris-Saclay - Etablissement de Saclay, Sorbonne Université, Service de Physique de l'État Condensé, CEA Paris-Saclay, Laboratoire de Physique Théorique de la Matière Condensée, Max Planck Institute for Dynamics and Self-Organization, Laboratoire Charles Coulomb, Soochow University
Language: English
Topic: Micro and Nano Robotics
Subfield: Condensed Matter Physics
Field: Physics and Astronomy
Domain: Physical Sciences
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W7223030840