Gap statistics of two interacting run and tumble particles in one dimension

Abstract

We study the dynamics of the separation (gap) between a pair of interacting run and tumble particles (RTPs) moving in one dimension in the presence of additional thermal noise. On a ring geometry the distribution of the gap approaches a steady state. We analytically compute this distribution and find that this is exponentially localised in space, in contrast to the `jammed' configuration, seen earlier in the absence of thermal noise. We also study the relaxation which is an exponential, characterised by a time scale $\tau_r$. We observe that this time scale undergoes a crossover from a size independent value to a size dependent form with increasing size $l$ of the ring. We study the full eigenvalue spectrum of the evolution operator $\mathcal{L}$ and find that the spectrum can be classified into four sectors depending on the symmetries of $\mathcal{L}$. For large $l$, we find explicit expressions for the low lying eigenvalues in each of the sectors. On infinite line the separation does not reach a steady state. In the long times we find that the particles behave as interacting Brownian particles, except for the presence of a peak in the distribution at small separation which is a remnant of activity.