Yongfeng Zhao Associate professor

2012–2016, Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) in Physics, Department of Physics, The University of Hong Kong. Advisors: Prof. Huang, Jian-Dong, Dr. Julien Tailleur.

2008–2012, Bachelor of Science (BSc) in Physics, School of Physics, Peking University. Advisor: Dr. Li, Fang-Ting.

2021–now, Associate professor, School of Physical Science and Technology, Soochow University, Suzhou.

2019–2021, Postdoctoral researcher, Institute of Natural Sciences, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, Shanghai. Collaborators: Prof. Masaki Sano, Prof. Hepeng Zhang.

2017–2018, Postdoctoral researcher, Laboratoire Matière et Systèmes complexes, Université Paris Diderot, Paris. Collaborator: Dr. Julien Tailleur.

I got my B.Sc. from School of Physics, Peking University (2008-2012). After graduation I obtained Ph.D. from Department of Physics, the University of Hong Kong (2012-2016). Then I worked in Laboratoire Matière et Systèmes Complexes, Université Paris Diderot as Postdoctoral Fellow (2017-2018), and then in the INS of SJTU as a Postdoctoral Fellow (2019-2021). Now I am an associate professor in the School of Physical Science and Technology, Soochow Univeristy (2021-now). I'm interested in the theories in biophysics, systems biology, and non-equilibrium statistical physics.

Homepage：zhaoyongfeng1990.github.io

github：zhaoyongfeng1990

Google Scholar

Most of my current research is on the active particles. I'm also interested in systems biology, nonlinear dynamical systems, and using machine learning methods in studying such complex systems.

Active particles are particles that can propel the motion of itself. It is an useful concept to describe the macroscopic motion of bacteria, mammalian cells, birds, fishes, and even human beings. Systems of active particles are very common in the nature.

A group of active particles is a typical far-from-equilibrium system. Each particle consume fuel (e.g. ATP) to generate a driving force, and the energy is dissipated by the friction from the surronding fluids or substrates. Usually because of thermal fluctuations of the solvent, or interal dynamics of motors of particles, the orientations of particles cannot persist at large enough time. Thus the conservations of energy and momentum of particles are broken at the very microscopic level.

That's why active particles can have many complex behaviors compared to the passive systems. A group of aligning particles can form clusters and move collectively. Chiral active particles can form rotating vortex. Even the simplest active particles with force interactions can have liquid-gas-like phase separation and even form patterns. Due to their far-from-equilibrium nature, the world of active particles is very vast.

I'm now working on:

1/ Surface tensions and interfacial phenomenon in active matter systems.

2/ Bacteria in complex environment and Fisher's wave.

3/ Using machine learning to extract macroscopic dynamic equations from active systems.

*Authors contributed equally

#Corresponding authors

[10] Christina Kurzthaler*,#, Yongfeng Zhao*,#, Nan Zhou, Jana Schwarz-Linek, Clemence Devailly, Jochen Arlt, Jian-Dong Huang, Wilson C. K. Poon, Thomas Franosch, Julien Tailleur#, Vincent A. Martinez#, Characterization and Control of the Run-and-Tumble Dynamics of Escherichia Coli. [arXiv] (2022)

[9] Yongfeng Zhao*,#, Christina Kurzthaler*,#, Nan Zhou, Jana Schwarz-Linek, Clemence Devailly, Jochen Arlt, Jian-Dong Huang, Wilson C. K. Poon, Thomas Franosch, Vincent A. Martinez#, Julien Tailleur#, Quantitative characterization of run-and-tumble statistics in bulk bacterial suspensions. [arXiv] (2022)

[8] Alberto Dinelli, Jérémy O'Byrne, Agnese Curatolo, Yongfeng Zhao, Peter Sollich, Julien Tailleur, Self-organization of bacterial mixtures in the presence of quorum-sensing interactions. [arXiv] (2022)

[7] Yongfeng Zhao, Non-interacting spherical active particles under confinement: generalized entropy potential, [arXiv] (2021)

[6] Zeng Tao Liu, Yan Shi, Yongfeng Zhao, Hugues Chaté#, Xia-qing Shi#, Tian Hui Zhang#, Subcritical active matter: Activity waves and freestanding vortices,Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. 118 (40) e2104724118(2021).

[5] Siyuan Yang, Mingji Huang, Yongfeng Zhao, Hepeng Zhang#, Controlling cell motion and microscale flow with polarized light fields, Phys. Rev. Lett. 126, 058001 (2021). [arXiv]

[4] Ruben Zakine*, Yongfeng Zhao*, Miloš Knežević, Adrian Daerr, Yariv Kafri, Julien Tailleur, Frédéric van Wijland, Surface Tensions between Active Fluids and Solid Interfaces: bare vs dressed, Phys. Rev. Lett. 124, 248003 (2020). [arXiv]

[3] Agnese I. Curatolo*, Nan Zhou*, Yongfeng Zhao*, Chenli Liu, Adrian Daerr, Julien Tailleur#, Jian-Dong Huang#, Cooperative pattern formation in multi-component bacterial systems through reciprocal motility regulation, Nat. Phys. 16, 1152–1157 (2020). [biorXiv]

[2] Eric Woillez, Yongfeng Zhao, Yariv Kafri, Vivien Lecomte, Julien Tailleur, “Activated escape of a self-propelled particle from a metastable state”, Phys. Rev. Lett. 122, 258001 (2019). [arXiv]

[1] Thibault Bertrand#, Yongfeng Zhao, Olivier Bénichou, Julien Tailleur, Raphaël Voituriez#, “Optimized Diffusion of Run-and-Tumble Particles in Crowded Environments”, Phys. Rev. Lett. 120, 198103 (2018). [arXiv]

Open for master or PhD students who are interested in theoretical physics and numerical simulations. Welcome undergraduate students to visit and study.