2008/08/31 by Jessica Hernández-Guzmán, Eric R. Weeks · 1 citation
Physics and Astronomy · #cond-mat.soft
paper · pdf · doi:10.1073/pnas.0904682106
published as Proc Nat Acad Sci 106, 15198-15202 (2009) · 6 pages; revised version, submitted to PNAS
arxiv created 2009/06/30 · arxiv updated 2009/12/01
We use confocal microscopy to study an equilibrated crystal-liquid interface in a colloidal suspension. Capillary waves roughen the surface, but locally the intrinsic interface is sharply defined. We use local measurements of the structure and dynamics to characterize the intrinsic interface, and different measurements find slightly different widths of this interface. In terms of the particle diameter d, this width is either 1.5d (based on structural information) or 2.4d (based on dynamics), both not much larger than the particle size. This work is the first direct experimental visualization of an equilibrated crystal-liquid interface.