2010/11/14 by Norizoe, Yuki, Kawakatsu, Toshihiro
#Computational Physics (physics.comp-ph) #FOS: Physical sciences #Materials Science (cond-mat.mtrl-sci) #Soft Condensed Matter (cond-mat.soft) #Statistical Mechanics (cond-mat.stat-mech)
paper · doi:10.48550/arxiv.1011.3205
Metastable structures in macromolecular and colloidal systems are non-equilibrium states that often have long lifetimes and cause difficulties in simulating equilibrium. In order to escape from the long-lived metastable states, we propose a newly devised method, molecular Monte-Carlo simulation of systems connected to 3 reservoirs: chemical potential μ, pressure P, and temperature T. One of these reservoirs is adjusted for the thermodynamic equilibrium condition according to Gibbs-Duhem equation, so that this adjusted 3rd reservoir does not thermodynamically affect phases and states. Additional degrees of freedom, i.e. system volume V and the number of particles N, reduce kinetic barriers of non-equilibrium states and facilitate quick equilibration. We show globally-anisotropic defect-free ordered structures, e.g. string-like colloidal assembly, are obtained via our method.