Related papers: Amorphous nucleation precursor in highly nonequili…
Homogeneous nucleation of a new phase near a second, continuous, transition, is considered. The continuous transition is in the metastable region associated with the first-order phase transition, one of whose coexisting phases is…
Polymorphism is ubiquitous in crystalline solids. Amorphous solids, such as glassy water and silicon, may undergo amorphous-to-amorphous transitions (AATs). The nature of AATs remains ambiguous, due to diverse system-dependent behaviors and…
Recent theories of nucleation that go beyond Classical Nucleation Theory predict that diffusion-limited nucleation of both liquid droplets and of crystals from a low-density vapor (or weak solution) begins with long-wavelength density…
Nucleonic matter displays a quantum liquid structure, but in some cases finite nuclei behave like molecules composed of clusters of protons and neutrons. Clustering is a recurrent feature in light nuclei, from beryllium to nickel. For…
In this study, molecular dynamic simulations are employed to investigate the nucleation of NaCl crystal in solutions. According to the simulations, the dissolved behaviors of NaCl in water are dependent on ion concentrations. With…
Using state-of-the-art rare-event sampling simulations, we precisely characterize the nucleation of liquid droplets from a supersaturated Lennard-Jones gas and uncover a key physical feature: critical clusters nucleate with a density that…
We present an experiment on crystallization of packings of macroscopic granular spheres. This system is often considered to be a model for thermally driven atomic or colloidal systems. Cyclically shearing a packing of frictional spheres, we…
Using Brownian dynamics computer simulations we show that a two-dimensional suspension of self-propelled ("active") colloidal particles crystallizes at sufficiently high densities. Compared to the equilibrium freezing of passive particles…
Structures of light unstable nuclei, Li, Be, B, and C isotopes are systematically studied with a microscopic method of antisymmetrized molecular dynamics. The theoretical method is found to be very useful to study ground and excited states…
The premelting of ice is well known, but little is known about how the premelted and solid surfaces convert to each other. In this work, the transition dynamics between two phases are revealed with large-scale molecular dynamics…
We study the nucleation of crystalline cluster phases in the generalized exponential model with exponent n=4. Due to the finite value of this pair potential for zero separation, at high densities the system forms cluster crystals with…
In culture migrating and interacting amoeboid cells can form nematic liquid crystal phases. A polar nematic liquid crystal is formed if the interaction has a polar symmetry. One type of white blood cells (granulocytes) form clusters where…
We systematically study the relationship between equilibrium and non-equilibrium phase diagrams of a system of short-ranged attractive colloids. Using Monte Carlo and Brownian dynamics simulations we find a window of enhanced…
Heterogeneous nucleation is a process wherein extrinsic impurities facilitate freezing by lowering nucleation barriers and constitutes the dominant mechanism for crystallization in most systems. Classical nucleation theory (\textsc{Cnt})…
Reactions of nuclear multifragmentation of excited finite nuclei can be interpreted as manifestation of the nuclear liquid-gas phase transition. During this process the matter at subnuclear density clusterizes into hot primary fragments,…
We demonstrate that nascent polymer crystals (i.e., nuclei) are anisotropic entities, with neither spherical nor cylindrical geometry, in contrast to previous assumptions. In fact, cylindrical, spherical, and other high symmetry geometries…
The noble elements constitute the simplest group of atoms. At low temperatures or high pressures they freeze into the face-centered cubic (fcc) crystal structure (except helium). We perform molecular dynamics using the recently proposed…
Systems with long-range interactions when quenced into a metastable state near the pseudo-spinodal exhibit nucleation processes that are quite different from the classical nucleation seen near the coexistence curve. In systems with…
One of most intriguing problems of heterogeneous crystal nucleation in droplets is its strong enhancement in the contact mode (when the foreign particle is presumably in some kind of contact with the droplet surface) compared to the…
Understanding the atomic-scale structure and dynamics of amorphous oxide surfaces is essential for interpreting their chemical reactivity, mechanical stability, and interfacial behavior, yet direct experimental characterization remains…