Non-equilibrium condensation and coarsening of field-driven dipolar colloids

Abstract

In colloidal suspensions, self-organization processes can be easily fueled by external fields. One particularly interesting class of phenomena occurs in monolayers of dipolar particles that are driven by rotating external fields. Here we report results from a computer simulation study of such systems focusing on the clustering behavior also observed in recent experiments. The key result of this paper is a novel interpretation of this pattern formation phenomenon: We show the clustering to be a by-product of a vapor-liquid first order phase transition. In fact, the observed dynamic coarsening process corresponds to the spindodal demixing that occurs during such a transition

6 pages, 5 figures

References in corpus (2)

• Statistical Mechanics of Interacting Run-and-Tumble Bacteria
• Simple models for two-dimensional tunable colloidal crystals in rotating ac electric fields

Cited by in corpus (8)

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• Emergent vortices and phase separation in systems of chiral active particles with dipolar interactions
• Dynamics of cluster formation in driven dipolar colloids dispersed on a monolayer
• Hydrodynamic interactions between solutes in multiparticle collision dynamics
• The structure and dynamics of self-assembling colloidal monolayers in oscillating magnetic fields
• Aging Phenomena during Phase Separation in Fluids: Decay of autocorrelation for vapor-liquid transitions
• Non-equilibrium quasi-long-range order of driven random field O(N) model
• Rotational ratchets with dipolar interactions