Torsion induced anisotropic energy propagation due to external perturbation

This paper analyzes anisotropic propagation of the change in interparticle potential energy ΔEIP due to the inclusion of a torsion within a dusty plasma crystal. The monolayer plasma crystal is perturbed at six different laser positions by a vertical laser incident on the crystal for a total of 21 pulses. A novel Voronoi weighted polar binning method is deployed to understand the laser-induced quasi-action ΔEIPTotal (sum over time of ΔEIP at a fixed position) throughout the crystal. It is determined that in addition to torsions being a perturbative presence within a plasma crystal, as previously documented, they are also a sensitive probe of perturbations to a crystal. It is demonstrated that the presence of a torsion causes anisotropic energy propagation for energy input via a laser pulse, which is incident on the crystal within a distance of approximately three interparticle spacings from a torsion.