Empty liquid state and re-entrant phase behavior of the patchy colloids confined in the porous media

Abstract

Patchy colloidal model with three and four equivalent patches, confined in the attractive random porous media, undergo re-entrant gas-liquid phase separation with the possibility for the liquid phase density to approach zero. This unusual behavior is caused by an interplay between strong fluid-fluid bonding interactions and weak fluid-matrix attractions. At high temperature the shape of the phase diagram is determined by the attractive interaction between the fluid particles; weak Yukawa attraction between fluid and obstacles only slightly enhances the fluid-fluid bonding. At low enough temperature the network of the fluid particles is formed and the shape of the phase diagram becomes defined by the Yukawa fluid-obstacle attraction. Due to this interaction a layer of mutually bonded particles around the obstacles is formed and the network becomes fluid particles in the network is defined by a spatial arrangement of the matrix particles. These features may open a new possibilities in making the equilibrium gels with the predefined nonuniform distribution of the particles.

arXiv comment5 pages, 4 figures

References in corpus (5)

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• Self-assembly in chains, rings and branches: a single component system with two critical points
• Phase diagrams of binary mixtures of patchy colloids with distinct numbers and types of patches: The empty fluid regime

Cited by in corpus (4)

• Two-step nucleation in a binary mixture of Patchy Particles
• Phase Behavior of the Patchy Colloids Confined in the Patchy Porous Media
• Thermodynamics of hard-sphere fluids in polydisperse random porous media: Extended scaled particle theory
• Behaviour of the model antibody fluid constrained by rigid spherical obstacles: effects of the obstacle-antibody binding