Journal of Colloid and Interface Science, Vol.281, No.1, 236-239, 2005
An oscillating electric field with thermal noise increases the rotational diffusion and drives rotation in a dipole
Here we consider a dipole in a viscous medium under the influence of an oscillating electric field and thermal noise. Because of the very low Reynolds numbers involved in molecular processes, we considered overdamped Langevin dynamics. As a consequence the inertia term becomes negligible. We observed a great increase in the rotational diffusion and also net rotation for some values of the parameters. (C) 2004 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.