Globally optimal volume-trap arrangements for the narrow-capture problem inside a unit sphere

Abstract

The determination of statistical characteristics for particles undergoing Brownian motion in constrained domains has multiple applications in various areas of research. This work presents an attempt to systematically compute globally optimal configurations of traps inside a three-dimensional domain that minimize the average of the mean first passage time (MFPT) for the narrow capture problem, the average time it takes a particle to be captured by any trap. For a given domain, the mean first passage time satisfies a linear Poisson problem with Dirichlet-Neumann boundary conditions. While no closed-form general solution of such problems is known, approximate asymptotic MFPT expressions for small traps in a unit sphere have been found. These solutions explicitly depend on trap parameters, including locations, through a pairwise potential function. After probing the applicability limits of asymptotic formulas through comparisons with numerical and available exact solutions of the narrow capture problem, full three-dimensional global optimization was performed to find optimal trap positions in the unit sphere for 2≤N≤100 identical traps. The interaction energy values and geometrical features of the putative optimal trap arrangements are presented.