Universal Scaling of Clustering Instability for Interacting Active Brownian Particles

Clustering is one of the mayor collective phenomena observed in active matter. We study the overdamped motion of interacting active Brownian particles in two dimensions. An instability in the pair correlation function causes the onset of clustering. This clustering mechanism depends mainly on the self-propulsion properties of the active particles and details of the interactions do not effect the scaling of the clustering instability. Theoretical predictions from repeated ring-kinetic theory are confirmed by agent-based simulations.