Hysteresis, laning, and negative drag in binary systems with opposite and perpendicular driving

Abstract We consider a binary system of particles with repulsive interactions that move in opposite or perpendicular directions to each other under an applied external drive. For opposite driving, at higher drives a phase-separated laned state forms that has strong hysteresis in the velocity–force curve and the fraction of topological defects as the drive is cycled up and down from zero. The amount of hysteresis depends on the drive value at which the drive changes from increasing to decreasing. For perpendicular driving, we find a jammed state that transitions into a disordered state or a tilted lane state, both of which also show strong hysteresis effects. Additionally, a negative drag effect can appear in which one species moves in the direction opposite to the other species due to a tilting of the lanes by the perpendicular drive. When a constant drive is applied along one direction while the drive in the perpendicular direction is increased, we observe a series of drops and jumps in the velocity as the system forms locked and tilted laned states. For weakly interacting particles, the jammed system can show co-tilted stripe-forming states. We show that these effects can also occur in systems with shorter-range repulsion and are robust against thermal fluctuations.