Active Motion Induced by Random Electromagnetic Fields

Active particles are capable of extracting energy from their environment and converting it into direct motion. This direct motion is usually attained by asymmetries, which induce a net force in the particle. In this article we show how a dimer made up of two nanoparticles can obtain this energy supply from the nonreciprocal force induced by an homogeneous and isotropic random electromagnetic field. We explicitly obtain the value of the force and find it to be different from zero only for sets of different particles in which at least one of them is absorbent. In addition, we prove that the nonreciprocity of the force is the condition for the interaction dynamics to be nonconservative. We further show how this mechanism can be used to induce active Brownian motion with persistent random walks, effective diffusion coefficients, and noticeable Péclet numbers.