Continuous and Discontinuous Transitions in the Depinning of Two-Dimensional Dusty Plasmas on a One-Dimensional Periodic Substrate

Abstract

Langevin dynamical simulations are performed to study the depinning dynamics of two-dimensional dusty plasmas on a one-dimensional periodic substrate. From the diagnostics of the sixfold coordinated particles $P_6$ and the collective drift velocity $V_x$, three different states appear, which are the pinning, disordered plastic flow, and moving ordered states. It is found that the depth of the substrate is able to modulate the properties of the depinning phase transition, based on the results of $P_6$ and $V_x$, as well as the observation of hysteresis of $V_x$ while increasing and decreasing the driving force monotonically. When the depth of the substrate is shallow, there are two continuous phase transitions. When the potential well depth slightly increases, the phase transition from the pinned to the disordered plastic flow states is continuous; however, the phase transition from the disordered plastic flow to the moving ordered states is discontinuous. When the substrate is even deeper, the phase transition from the pinned to the disordered plastic flow states changes to discontinuous. When the substrate further increases, as the driving force increases, the pinned state changes to the moving ordered state directly, so that the disordered plastic flow state disappears completely.

9 pages, 5 postscript figures

References in corpus (5)

• Viscoelasticity of 2D liquids quantified in a dusty plasma experiment
• Slow plastic creep of 2D dusty plasma solids
• Rapid heating and cooling in two-dimensional Yukawa systems
• Mode coupling and resonance instabilities in quasi-two-dimensional dust clusters in complex plasmas
• Oscillation-like diffusion of two-dimensional liquid dusty plasmas on one-dimensional periodic substrates with varied widths

Cited by in corpus (5)

• Directional Locking in a 2D Yukawa Solid Modulated by a 2D Periodic Substrate
• Phonon spectra of a two-dimensional solid dusty plasma modified by two-dimensional periodic substrates
• Superlubric-pinned transition of a two-dimensional solid dusty plasma under a periodic triangular substrate
• Dynamical commensuration effect in a two-dimensional Yukawa solid modulated by periodic substrates
• Driven dust-charge fluctuation and chaotic ion dynamics in the plasma sheath and pre-sheath regions