Abstract

Attractors such as fixed points, limit cycles and strange attractors emerge in nonlinear dynamical systems, however, such attractors may also be used as fundamental units to drive complex dynamics. By using a low-dimensional chaotic dynamical system to model each particle’s internal state space, we present a new class of matter coined “attractor-driven matter”. Through illustrative examples, I will show how attractor-driven particles when combined with particle-particle interactions can give rise to complex dynamical and emergent behaviors reminiscent of active matter. This formalism may be applicable more broadly, to model complex dynamical and emergent behaviors in a variety of contexts.