Related papers: Crystal growth in confinement
Recent experimental and theoretical investigations of crystal growth from solution in the vicinity of an impermeable wall have shown that: (i) growth can be maintained within the contact region when a liquid film is present between the…
Growing crystals form a cavity when placed against a wall. The birth of the cavity is observed both by optical microscopy of sodium chlorate crystals (NaClO$_3$) growing in the vicinity of a glass surface, and in simulations with a thin…
Crystals in nature often demonstrate curved morphologies rather than classical faceted surfaces. Inspired by biogenic curved single crystals, we demonstrate that gold single crystals exhibiting curved surfaces can be grown with no need of…
A crystal of pure nickel grows from its melt at a rate that reaches 70 meters per second. This extraordinary growth rate has led to the suggestion that metallic crystals might provide the next generation of phase change materials. The huge…
Salt crystallization is a major cause of weathering of artworks, monuments and rocks. Damage will occur if crystals continue to grow in confinement, i.e. within the pore space of these materials generating mechanical stresses. We report on…
The forces exerted by growing crystals on the surrounding materials play a major role in many geological processes, from diagenetic replacement to rock weathering and uplifting of rocks and soils. Although crystallization is a…
Crystallization is a fundamental process in materials science, providing the primary route for the realization of a wide range of new materials. Crystallization rates are also considered to be useful probes of glass-forming ability. At the…
Crystal growth and crystal coalescence processes in supercooled systems strongly depend on the concentration of crystallization centers. We perform atomistic dynamics simulations of the crystallization process in the ultrathin metallic film…
We investigate the growth of a crystal that is built by depositing cubes onto the inside of a corner. The interface of this crystal evolves into a limiting shape in the long-time limit. Building on known results for the corresponding…
When colloidal particles form a crystal phase on a spherical template, their packing is governed by the effective interaction between them and the elastic strain of bending the growing crystal. For example, if growth commences under…
We study the evolution from a liquid to a crystal phase in two-dimensional curved space. At early times, while crystal seeds grow preferentially in regions of low curvature, the lattice frustration produced in regions with high curvature is…
We simulate a strongly size-disperse hard-sphere fluid confined between two parallel, hard walls. We find that confinement induces crystallization into n-layered hexagonal lattices and a novel honeycomb-shaped structure, facilitated by…
Crystallization pressure drives deformation and damage in monuments, buildings and the Earth's crust. Even though the phenomenon has been known for 170 years there is no agreement between theoretical calculations of the maximum attainable…
We report on the modeling of the formation of a cavity at the surface of crystals confined by a flat wall during growth in solution. Using a continuum thin film model, we discuss two phenomena that could be observed when decreasing the…
The mechanical properties of crystalline materials can be substantially modified under confinement. Such modified macroscopic properties are usually governed by the altered microstructures and internal stress fields. Here, we use a parallel…
Chemical gardens are mineral aggregates that grow in three dimensions with plant-like forms and share properties with self-assembled structures like nano-scale tubes, brinicles or chimneys at hydrothermal vents. The analysis of their shapes…
Using molecular dynamics calculations and the Voronoi tessellation, we study the evolution of the local structure of a soft-sphere glass versus temperature starting from the liquid phase at different quenching rates. This study is done for…
The shape of nanocrystals is crucial in determining their surface area, reactivity, optical properties, mechanical strength, and self-assembly behavior. Traditionally, shape control has been achieved through empirical methods, highlighting…
Designing and fabricating self-assembled open colloidal crystals have become one major direction in soft matter community because of many promising applications associated with open colloidal crystals. However, most of the self-assembled…
Crystallization represents the prime example of a disorder order transition. In realistic situations, however, container walls and impurities are frequently present and hence crystallization is heterogeneously seeded. Rarely the seeds are…