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arXiv · 1605.05389

Crystallization kinetics of binary colloidal monolayers

An T. Pham·Ryohei Seto·Johannes Schonke·Daniel Y. Joh·Ashutosh Chilkoti·Eliot Fried·Benjamin B. Yellen
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Abstract

Experiments and simulations are used to study the kinetics of crystal growth in a mixture of magnetic and nonmagnetic particles suspended in ferrofluid. The growth process is quantified using both a bond order parameter and a mean domain size parameter. The largest single crystals obtained in experiments consist of approximately 1000 particles and form if the area fraction is held between 65-70% and the field strength is kept in the range of 8.5-10.5 Oe. Simulations indicate that much larger single crystals containing as many as 5000 particles can be obtained in impurity-free conditions within a few hours. If our simulations are modified to include impurity concentrations as small as 1-2%, then the results agree quantitatively with the experiments. These findings provide an important step toward developing strategies for growing single crystals that are large enough to enable follow-on investigations across many subdisciplines in condensed matter physics.

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An T. Pham, Ryohei Seto, Johannes Schonke, Daniel Y. Joh, Ashutosh Chilkoti, Eliot Fried, Benjamin B. Yellen. 2016-05-17. Crystallization kinetics of binary colloidal monolayers. https://doi.org/10.1039/c6sm01072e

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