Evidence map›Paper›PMID 40127258›Full record

ArticleProceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America2025

Order-disorder transition in multidirectional crowds.

Karol A Bacik, Grzegorz Sobota, Bogdan S Bacik, Tim Rogers

Abstract read
In one paragraph

Article in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 2025. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 3 papers.

0numbers the graph read from it
0cells of the map it votes in
3citing papers in PubMed
–field-weighted citation impact
1 · What the graph read from it

What it found

Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.

The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.

2 · The registry

The trial behind it

Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.

Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.

3 · Its place in the literature

Who cites it

3 citing papers in PubMed.

  1. Avalanches of choice: How stranger-to-stranger interactions shape crowd dynamics.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2026
    Article
  2. Lane formation in criss-crossing crowds.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2025
    Article
  3. Order-disorder transition in multidirectional crowds.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2025
    Article
4 · The record

Corrections and comments

5 · Who and what money

Authors and funding

4 authors.

Karol A BacikDepartment of Mathematics, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA 02142.ORCID 0000-0001-5263-4353
Grzegorz SobotaDepartment of Human Motor Behavior, Academy of Physical Education in Katowice, Katowice 40-065, Poland.ORCID 0000-0002-8281-0431
Bogdan S BacikDepartment of Human Motor Behavior, Academy of Physical Education in Katowice, Katowice 40-065, Poland.ORCID 0000-0002-9894-3474
Tim RogersDepartment of Mathematical Sciences, University of Bath, Claverton Down, Bath BA2 7AY, United Kingdom.ORCID 0000-0002-5733-1658

Funding

UKRI | Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC) EP/V048228/1
6 · The paper itself

Abstract

One of the archetypal examples of active flows is a busy concourse crossed by people moving in different directions according to their personal destinations. When the crowd is isotropic-comprising individuals moving in all different directions-the collective motion is disordered. In contrast, if it is possible to identify two dominant directions of motion, for example in a corridor, the crowd spontaneously organizes into contraflowing lanes or stripes. In this article, we characterize the physics of the transition between these two distinct phases by using a synergy of theoretical analysis, numerical simulations, and stylized experiments. We develop a hydrodynamic theory for collisional flows of heterogeneous populations, and we analyze the stability of the disordered configuration. We identify an order-disorder transition occurring as population heterogeneity exceeds a theoretical threshold determined by the collision avoidance maneuvers of the crowd. Our prediction for the onset of pedestrian ordering is consistent with results of agent-based simulations and controlled experiments with human crowds.

Indexed as

active matterpedestrian dynamicsself-organized

Identifiers

PMID40127258
PMCPMC12002293

What OpenQuestion holds

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Registered trials

None linked

Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.