Surface order parameter

A feature of a critical point, line, or surface is that it is located where divergences of various properties, in particular correlation lengths, occur. Moreover it is reasonable to assume that at such a point there is always an order parameter that is zero on one side of the transition and tliat becomes nonzero on the other side. Nothing of this sort occurs at a first-order transition, even the gradual liquid-gas transition shown in figure A2.5.3 and figure A2.5.4. 

Two physically reasonable but quite different models have been used to describe the internal motions of lipid molecules observed by neutron scattering. In the first the protons are assumed to undergo diffusion in a sphere [63]. The radius of the sphere is allowed to be different for different protons. Although the results do not seem to be sensitive to the details of the variation in the sphere radii, it is necessary to have a range of sphere volumes, with the largest volume for methylene groups near the ends of the hydrocarbon chains in the middle of the bilayer and the smallest for the methylenes at the tops of the chains, closest to the bilayer surface. This is consistent with the behavior of the carbon-deuterium order parameters,. S cd, measured by deuterium NMR ... 

E. V. Aibano. Determination of the order-parameter critical exponent of an irreversible dimer-monomer surface reaction model. Phys Rev E 49 1738-1739, 1994. 

First we look at the simpler case of the shrinking of a single cluster of radius R at two-phase coexistence. Assume that the phase inside this cluster and the surrounding phase are at thermodynamic equilibrium, apart from the surface tension associated with the cluster surface. This surface tension exerts a force or pressure inside the cluster, which makes the cluster energetically unfavorable so that it shrinks, under diffusive release of the conserved quantity (matter or energy) associated with the order parameter. 

Figure 36 is a three dimensional representation of the order parameter P at 350 K after 19.2 ns of simulation, where about 25% of the system has transformed into the crystalline state. The black regions near both side surfaces correspond to the crystalline domains with higher P values, while the white regions are in a completely isotropic state of P = 0. Detailed inspection of these data has shown that no appreciable order is present in the melt. A simple interface model between the crystal and the isotropic melt seems to be more plausible at least in this case of short chain Cioo-... 

Transition matrix estimators have received less attention than the multicanonical and Wang-Landau methods, but have been applied to a small collection of informative examples. Smith and Bruce [111, 112] applied the transition probability approach to the determination of solid-solid phase coexistence in a square-well model of colloids. Erring ton and coworkers [113, 114] have also used the method to determine liquid-vapor and solid-liquid [115] equilibria in the Lennard-Jones system. Transition matrices have also been used to generate high-quality data for the evaluation of surface tension [114, 116] and for the estimation of order parameter weights in phase-switch simulations [117]. 

Compared to US and its subsequent variants, the ABF method obviates the a priori knowledge of the free energy surface. As a result, exploration of is only driven by the self-diffusion properties of the system. It should be clearly understood, however, that while the ABF helps progression along the order parameter, the method s efficiency depends on the (possibly slow) relaxation of the collective degrees of freedom orthogonal to . This explains the considerable simulation time required to model the dimerization of the transmembrane domain of glycophorin A in a simplified membrane [54],... 

Here scalar order parameter, has the interpretation of a normalized difference between the oil and water concentrations go is the strength of surfactant and /o is the parameter describing the stability of the microemulsion and is proportional to the chemical potential of the surfactant. The constant go is solely responsible for the creation of internal surfaces in the model. The microemulsion or the lamellar phase forms only when go is negative. The function/(<))) is the bulk free energy and describes the coexistence of the pure water phase (4> = —1), pure oil phase (4> = 1), and microemulsion (< ) = 0), provided that/o = 0 (in the mean-held approximation). One can easily calculate the correlation function (4>(r)(0)) — (4>(r) (4>(0)) in various bulk homogeneous phases. In the microemulsion this function oscillates, indicating local correlations between water-rich and oil-rich domains. In the pure water or oil phases it should decay monotonically to zero. This does occur, provided that g2 > 4 /TT/o — go- Because of the < ), —<(> (oil-water) symmetry of the model, the interface between the oil-rich and water-rich domains is given by... 

In this simple model characterized by a single scalar order parameter, the structures with periodic surfaces are metastable. It simply means that we need a more complex model including the surfactant degrees of freedom (its polar nature) in order to stabilize structures with P, D, and G surfaces. In the Ciach model [120-122] indeed the introduction of additional degrees of freedom stabilizes such structures. 

Here the angular brackets mean that the ensemble average is taken, and the angle 3 can be defined and computed for each bond in the molecule. When a bond is perfectly aligned normal to the bilayer surface, the order parameter assumes a value of unity. In a random orientation, the order parameter is zero. Bonds that are perfectly aligned parallel to the surface gives a negative order parameter of S = —0.5. 

Azz - (1/2 Axx + 1/2 Ayy) is the maximum anisotropy in hyperfine splitting that is possible. The anisotropy observed in Figure 6, and reported in Table 3 below, is much smaller than the maximum. One can quantify the degree of surface ordering by defining an order parameters, 8 ... 

The values of these autocorrelation functions at times t = 0 and t = 00 are related to the two order parameters orientational averages of the second- and fourth-rank Legendre polynomial P2(cos/ ) and P4 (cos p). respectively, relative to the orientation p of the probe axis with respect to the normal to the local bilayer surface or with respect to the liquid crystal direction. The order parameters are defined as... 

We review Monte Carlo calculations of phase transitions and ordering behavior in lattice gas models of adsorbed layers on surfaces. The technical aspects of Monte Carlo methods are briefly summarized and results for a wide variety of models are described. Included are calculations of internal energies and order parameters for these models as a function of temperature and coverage along with adsorption isotherms and dynamic quantities such as self-diffusion constants. We also show results which are applicable to the interpretation of experimental data on physical systems such as H on Pd(lOO) and H on Fe(110). Other studies which are presented address fundamental theoretical questions about the nature of phase transitions in a two-dimensional geometry such as the existence of Kosterlitz-Thouless transitions or the nature of dynamic critical exponents. Lastly, we briefly mention multilayer adsorption and wetting phenomena and touch on the kinetics of domain growth at surfaces. 

---