P1

P1: Hot Brownian Motion

We plan to study the Brownian motion of laser-heated micro- and nanoparticles and to develop and test an effective Markov theory for such “hot Brownian motion”. We aim to establish these thermally isotropic particles as an efficient new quantitative tracer and spectroscopy tool, complementary to widely applied fluorescence techniques. Extending the concept of thermally manipulated Brownian motion we will consider heated particles with anisotropic temperature profiles to explore relations to the phenomenology and theory of self-propelled particles and active hydrodynamics, and options for applications in nanoscience and nanotechnology. The project integrates challenging tasks in sample preparation (surface functionalization, self-assembly of particle chains and 3D DNA construction), experiment (optics, single-molecule detection and manipulation, polymer physics and physics of nanoparticles), and theory (non-equilibrium statistical mechanics and fluctuating hydrodynamics), to be addressed by three closely collaborating groups from Leipzig and Dresden. The results of this project shall pave the way for applications of nanoscale heat sources to control nanoscale transport by optical means.