A phase-field-crystal approach to critical nuclei

Abstract

We investigate a phase-field-crystal model for homogeneous nucleation. Instead of solving the time evolution of a density field towards equilibrium we use a String Method to identify saddle points in phase space. The saddle points allow to obtain the nucleation barrier and the critical nucleus. The advantage of using the phase-field-crystal model for this task is its ability to resolve atomistic effects. The obtained results indicate different properties of the critical nucleus compared with bulk crystals and show a detailed description of the nucleation process.

12 pages, 5 figures, submitted

References in corpus (12)

• String Method for the Study of Rare Events
• Modeling Elasticity in Crystal Growth
• Phase-field crystal study of grain-boundary premelting
• Derivation of the phase field crystal model for colloidal solidification
• Diffusive Atomistic Dynamics of Edge Dislocations in Two Dimensions
• Nucleation and Bulk Crystallization in Binary Phase Field Theory
• Phase-field crystal modeling of equilibrium bcc-liquid interfaces
• Renormalization group approach to multiscale simulation of polycrystalline materials using the phase field crystal model
• Phase Field Theory of Heterogeneous Crystal Nucleation
• Adaptive mesh computation of polycrystalline pattern formation using a renormalization-group reduction of the phase-field crystal model
• Phase Diagram and Commensurate-Incommensurate Transitions in the Phase Field Crystal Model with an External Pinning Potential
• Minimum free-energy path of homogenous nucleation from the phase-field equation

Cited by in corpus (7)

• Phase-field-crystal models for condensed matter dynamics on atomic length and diffusive time scales: an overview
• Classical dynamical density functional theory: from fundamentals to applications
• How crystals form: A theory of nucleation pathways
• Deriving phase field crystal theory from dynamical density functional theory: consequences of the approximations
• Development and Analysis of a Block-Preconditioner for the Phase-Field Crystal Equation
• Liquid to solid nucleation via onion structure droplets
• Dimension reduction and optimality of the uniform state in a Phase-Field-Crystal model involving a higher order functional