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We conduct an extensive study of nonlinear localized modes (NLMs), which are temporally periodic and spatially localized structures, in a two-dimensional array of repelling magnets. In our experiments, we arrange a lattice in a hexagonal configuration with a light-mass defect, and we harmonically drive the center of the chain with a tunable excitation frequency, amplitude, and angle. We use a damped, driven variant of a vector Fermi- Pasta-Ulam-Tsingou lattice to model our experimental setup. Despite the idealized nature of the model, we obtain good qualitative agreement between theory and experiments for a variety of dynamical behaviors. We find that the spatial decay is direction-dependent and that drive amplitudes along fundamental displacement axes lead to nonlinear resonant peaks in frequency continuations that are similar to those that occur in one-dimensional damped, driven lattices. However, driving along other directions leads to the creation of asymmetric NLMs that bifurcate from the main solution branch, which consists of symmetric NLMs. When we vary the drive amplitude, we observe such behavior both in our experiments and in our simulations. We also demonstrate that solutions that appear to be time-quasi-periodic bifurcate from the branch of symmetric time-periodic NLMs.

We study - experimentally, theoretically, and numerically - nonlinear excitations in lattices of magnets with long-range interactions. We examine breather solutions, which are spatially localized and periodic in time, in a chain with algebraically-decaying interactions. It was established two decades ago [S. Flach, Phys. Rev. E 58, R4116 (1998)] that lattices with long-range interactions can have breather solutions in which the spatial decay of the tails has a crossover from exponential to algebraic decay. In this Letter, we revisit this problem in the setting of a chain of repelling magnets with a mass defect and verify, both numerically and experimentally, the existence of breathers with such a crossover.

We study frequency conversion in nonlinear mechanical lattices, focusing on a chain of magnets as a model system. We show that by inserting mass defects at suitable locations, we can introduce localized vibrational modes that nonlinearly couple to extended lattice modes. The nonlinear interaction introduces an energy transfer from the high-frequency localized modes to a low-frequency extended mode. This system is capable of autonomously converting energy between highly tunable input and output frequencies, which need not be related by integer harmonic or subharmonic ratios. It is also capable of obtaining energy from multiple sources at different frequencies with a tunable output phase, due to the defect synchronization provided by the extended mode. Our lattice is a purely mechanical analog of an opto-mechanical system, where the localized modes play the role of the electromagnetic field, and the extended mode plays the role of the mechanical degree of freedom.

Stochastic heat engines are devices that generate work from random thermal motion using a small number of highly fluctuating degrees of freedom. Proposals for such devices have existed for more than a century and include the Maxwell demon and the Feynman ratchet. Only recently have they been demonstrated experimentally, using e.g., thermal cycles implemented in optical traps. However, the recent demonstrations of stochastic heat engines are nonautonomous, since they require an external control system that prescribes a heating and cooling cycle, and consume more energy than they produce. This Report presents a heat engine consisting of three coupled mechanical resonators (two ribbons and a cantilever) subject to a stochastic drive. The engine uses geometric nonlinearities in the resonating ribbons to autonomously convert a random excitation into a low-entropy, nonpassive oscillation of the cantilever. The engine presents the anomalous heat transport property of negative thermal conductivity, consisting in the ability to passively transfer energy from a cold reservoir to a hot reservoir.

We theoretically and experimentally investigate visco-thermal effects on the acoustic propagation through metamaterials consisting of rigid slabs with subwavelength slits embedded in air. We demonstrate that this unavoidable loss mechanism is not merely a refinement, but it plays a dominant role in the actual acoustic response of the structure. Specifically, in the case of very narrow slits, the visco-thermal losses avoid completely the excitation of Fabry-Perot resonances, leading to 100% reflection. This is exactly opposite to the perfect transmission predicted in the idealised lossless case. Moreover, for a wide range of geometrical parameters, there exists an optimum slit width at which the energy dissipated in the structure can be as high as 50%. This work provides a clear evidence that visco-thermal effects are necessary to describe realistically the acoustic response of locally resonant metamaterials.

Lenses that can collect the perfect image of an object must restore propagative and evanescent waves. However, for efficient information transfer, e.g., in compressed sensing, it is often desirable to detect only the fast spatial variations of the wave field (carried by evanescent waves), as the one created by edges or small details. Image processing edge detection algorithms perform such operation but they add time and complexity to the imaging process. Here, we present a new subwavelength approach that generates an image of only those components of the acoustic field that are equal to or smaller than the operating wavelength. The proposed technique converts evanescent waves into propagative waves exciting trapped resonances in a waveguide, and it uses periodicity to attenuate the propagative components. This approach achieves resolutions about an order of magnitude smaller than the operating wavelength and makes it possible to visualize independently edges aligned along different directions.