Arrested Dimer’s Diffusion by Self-Induced Back-Action Optical Forces

Jorge Luis-Hita, Juan José Sáenz, and Manuel I. Marqués

The diffusion of a dimer made out of two resonant dipolar scatters in an optical lattice is theoretically analyzed. When a small particle diffuses through an optically induced potential landscape, its Brownian motion can be strongly suppressed by gradient forces, proportional to the particle’s polarizability. For a single lossless monomer at resonance, the gradient force vanishes and the particle diffuses as in absence of external fields. However, we show that when two monomers link in a dimer, the multiple scattering among the monomers induces both a torque and a net force on the dimer’s center of mass. This “self-induced back-action” force leads to an effective potential energy landscape, entirely dominated by the mutual interaction between monomers, which strongly influences the dynamics of the dimer. Under appropriate illumination, single monomers in a colloidal suspension freely diffuse while dimers become trapped. Our theoretical predictions are tested against extensive Langevin molecular dynamics simulations.

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