Related papers: Nucleation and Bulk Crystallization in Binary Phas…
We determined bulk crystal nucleation rates in aqueous suspensions of charged spheres at low metastability. Experiments were performed in dependence on electrolyte concen-tration and for two different particle number densities. The…
We present adaptive finite element simulations of dendritic and eutectic solidification in binary and ternary alloys. The computations are based on a recently formulated phase-field model that is especially appropriate for modelling…
Crystallization represents a fundamental process engendering solidification of a material and determines its microstructure. Driven by complex phenomena at the atomic scale, its understanding for alloys still remains elusive. The present…
The nucleation of a droplet of stable cylinder phase from a metastable lamellar phase is examined within the single-mode approximation to the Brazovskii model for diblock copolymer melts. By employing a variational ansatz for the droplet…
Phase transformations can be difficult to characterize at the microscopic level due to the inability to directly observe individual atomic motions. Model colloidal systems, by contrast, permit the direct observation of individual particle…
This thesis can be divided into two independent parts. In the first part of this thesis, we focus on studying the kinetic pathways of nucleation in colloidal systems. In Chapter 2, we briefly introduce the relevant theory of nucleation,…
In this work, a phase-field model is developed for the dendritic growth with gas bubbles in the solidification of binary alloys. In this model, a total free energy for the complex gas-liquid-dendrite system is proposed through considering…
Classical nucleation theory is used to estimate the free-energy barrier to nucleation of the solid phase of particles interacting via a potential which has a short-ranged attraction. Due to the high interfacial tension between the fluid and…
First-order phase transitions that proceed via nucleation of bubbles are described by the homogeneous nucleation theory of Langer. The nucleation rate is one of the most interesting parameters of these transitions. In previous works we have…
We present a theoretical description of a mechanism for self assembly in binary soft nanoparticle systems of the type which were studied experimentally by Talapin et al [1]. We focus on, in particular, the conditions for formation of…
The dynamics of glass formation in monatomic and binary liquids are studied numerically using a microscopic field theory for the evolution of the time-averaged atomic number density. A stochastic framework combining phase field crystal free…
Wigner crystallization of electrons in a 2D quantum dots is reported. It proceeds in two stages: I) via radial ordering of electrons on shells and II) freezing of the inter-shell rotation. The phase boundary of the crystal is computed in…
We study low-salt, binary aqueous suspensions of charged colloidal spheres of size ratio Phi = 0.57, number densities below the eutectic number density n_E, and number fractions of p = 1.00-0.40. The typical phase obtained by solidification…
The nucleation of a lamellar phase from a supercooled homogeneous phase in a fluctuation driven first-order transition is studied, based on a phenomenological free energy due to Brazovskii. The absence of phase coexistence in the…
Nucleation is an activated process in which the system has to overcome a free energy barrier in order for a first-order phase transition between the metastable and the stable phases to take place. In the liquid-to-solid transition the…
We report a numerical study of the rate of crystal nucleation in a binary suspension of oppositely charged colloids. Two different crystal structures compete in the thermodynamic conditions under study. We find that the crystal phase that…
Accurate estimate of nucleation rate is crucial for the study of ice nucleation and ice-promoting/anti-freeze strategies. Within the framework of Classical Nucleation Theory (CNT), the estimate of ice nucleation rate is very sensitive to…
The quantitative phase-field approach has been adapted to model solidification in the presence of Metal Matrix Nanocomposites (MMNCs) in a single-component liquid. Nanoparticles of fixed size and shape are represented by additional fields.…
We show that one can employ well-established numerical continuation methods to efficiently calculate the phase diagram for thermodynamic systems. In particular, this involves the determination of lines of phase coexistence related to first…
A coarsened model for a binary system with limited miscibility of components is proposed; the system is described in terms of structural states in small parts of the material. The material is assumed to have two alternative types of…