430 research outputs found
Accurate description of bulk and interfacial properties in colloid-polymer mixtures
Large-scale Monte Carlo simulations of a phase-separating colloid-polymer
mixture are performed and compared to recent experiments. The approach is based
on effective interaction potentials in which the central monomers of
self-avoiding polymer chains are used as effective coordinates. By
incorporating polymer nonideality together with soft colloid-polymer repulsion,
the predicted binodal is in excellent agreement with recent experiments. In
addition, the interfacial tension as well as the capillary length are in
quantitative agreement with experimental results obtained at a number of points
in the phase-coexistence region, without the use of any fit parametersComment: 4 pages, 4 figure
Simulation and theory of fluid demixing and interfacial tension of mixtures of colloids and non-ideal polymers
An extension of the Asakura-Oosawa-Vrij model of hard sphere colloids and
non-adsorbing polymers, that takes polymer non-ideality into account through a
repulsive stepfunction pair potential between polymers, is studied with grand
canonical Monte Carlo simulations and density functional theory. Simulation
results validate previous theoretical findings for the shift of the bulk fluid
demixing binodal upon increasing strength of polymer-polymer repulsion,
promoting the tendency to mix. For increasing strength of the polymer-polymer
repulsion, simulation and theory consistently predict the interfacial tension
of the free colloidal liquid-gas interface to decrease significantly for fixed
colloid density difference in the coexisting phases, and to increase for fixed
polymer reservoir packing fraction.Comment: 10 pages, 4 figure
Wall-Fluid and Liquid-Gas Interfaces of Model Colloid-Polymer Mixtures by Simulation and Theory
We perform a study of the interfacial properties of a model suspension of
hard sphere colloids with diameter and non-adsorbing ideal polymer
coils with diameter . For the mixture in contact with a planar hard
wall, we obtain from simulations the wall-fluid interfacial free energy,
, for size ratios and 1, using
thermodynamic integration, and study the (excess) adsorption of colloids,
, and of polymers, , at the hard wall. The interfacial
tension of the free liquid-gas interface, , is obtained following
three different routes in simulations: i) from studying the system size
dependence of the interfacial width according to the predictions of capillary
wave theory, ii) from the probability distribution of the colloid density at
coexistence in the grand canonical ensemble, and iii) for statepoints where the
colloidal liquid wets the wall completely, from Young's equation relating
to the difference of wall-liquid and wall-gas interfacial
tensions, . In addition, we calculate , and using density functional theory and a scaled particle
theory based on free volume theory. Good agreement is found between the
simulation results and those from density functional theory, while the results
from scaled particle theory quantitatively deviate but reproduce some essential
features. Simulation results for obtained from the three
different routes are all in good agreement. Density functional theory predicts
with good accuracy for high polymer reservoir packing fractions,
but yields deviations from the simulation results close to the critical point.Comment: 23 pages, 10 figures, REVTEX. Fig 5a changed. Final versio
Critical phenomena in colloid-polymer mixtures: interfacial tension, order parameter, susceptibility and coexistence diameter
The critical behavior of a model colloid-polymer mixture, the so-called AO
model, is studied using computer simulations and finite size scaling
techniques. Investigated are the interfacial tension, the order parameter, the
susceptibility and the coexistence diameter. Our results clearly show that the
interfacial tension vanishes at the critical point with exponent 2\nu ~ 1.26.
This is in good agreement with the 3D Ising exponent. Also calculated are
critical amplitude ratios, which are shown to be compatible with the
corresponding 3D Ising values. We additionally identify a number of subtleties
that are encountered when finite size scaling is applied to the AO model. In
particular, we find that the finite size extrapolation of the interfacial
tension is most consistent when logarithmic size dependences are ignored. This
finding is in agreement with the work of Berg et al.[Phys. Rev. B, V47 P497
(1993)]Comment: 13 pages, 16 figure
As a Matter of Factions: The Budgetary Implications of Shifting Factional Control in Japan’s LDP
For 38 years, the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) maintained single-party control over the Japanese government. This lack of partisan turnover in government has frustrated attempts to explain Japanese government policy changes using political variables. In this paper, we look for intraparty changes that may have led to changes in Japanese budgetary policy. Using a simple model of agenda-setting, we hypothesize that changes in which intraparty factions “control” the LDP affect the party’s decisions over spending priorities systematically. This runs contrary to the received wisdom in the voluminous literature on LDP factions, which asserts that factions, whatever their raison d’être, do not exhibit different policy preferences. We find that strong correlations do exist between which factions comprise the agenda-setting party “mainstream” and how the government allocates spending across pork-barrel and public goods items
Phase behavior and structure of model colloid-polymer mixtures confined between two parallel planar walls
Using Gibbs ensemble Monte Carlo simulations and density functional theory we
investigate the fluid-fluid demixing transition in inhomogeneous
colloid-polymer mixtures confined between two parallel plates with separation
distances between one and ten colloid diameters covering the complete range
from quasi two-dimensional to bulk-like behavior. We use the
Asakura-Oosawa-Vrij model in which colloid-colloid and colloid-polymer
interactions are hard-sphere like, whilst the pair potential between polymers
vanishes. Two different types of confinement induced by a pair of parallel
walls are considered, namely either through two hard walls or through two
semi-permeable walls that repel colloids but allow polymers to freely
penetrate. For hard (semi-permeable) walls we find that the capillary binodal
is shifted towards higher (lower) polymer fugacities and lower (higher) colloid
fugacities as compared to the bulk binodal; this implies capillary condensation
(evaporation) of the colloidal liquid phase in the slit. A macroscopic
treatment is provided by a novel symmetric Kelvin equation for general binary
mixtures, based on the proximity in chemical potentials of statepoints at
capillary coexistence and the reference bulk coexistence. Results for capillary
binodals compare well with those obtained from the classic version of the
Kelvin equation due to Evans and Marini Bettolo Marconi [J. Chem. Phys. 86,
7138 (1987)], and are quantitatively accurate away from the fluid-fluid
critical point, even at small wall separations. For hard walls the density
profiles of polymers and colloids inside the slit display oscillations due to
packing effects for all statepoints. For semi-permeable walls either similar
structuring or flat profiles are found, depending on the statepoint considered.Comment: 15 pages, 13 figure
Critical behavior in colloid-polymer mixtures: theory and simulation
We extensively investigated the critical behavior of mixtures of colloids and
polymers via the two-component Asakura-Oosawa model and its reduction to a
one-component colloidal fluid using accurate theoretical and simulation
techniques. In particular the theoretical approach, hierarchical reference
theory [Adv. Phys. 44, 211 (1995)], incorporates realistically the effects of
long-range fluctuations on phase separation giving exponents which differ
strongly from their mean-field values, and are in good agreement with those of
the three-dimensional Ising model. Computer simulations combined with
finite-size scaling analysis confirm the Ising universality and the accuracy of
the theory, although some discrepancy in the location of the critical point
between one-component and full-mixture description remains. To assess the limit
of the pair-interaction description, we compare one-component and two-component
results.Comment: 15 pages, 10 figures. Submitted to Phys. Rev.
Rosenfeld functional for non-additive hard spheres
The fundamental measure density functional theory for hard spheres is
generalized to binary mixtures of arbitrary positive and moderate negative
non-additivity between unlike components. In bulk the theory predicts
fluid-fluid phase separation into phases with different chemical compositions.
The location of the accompanying critical point agrees well with previous
results from simulations over a broad range of non-additivities and both for
symmetric and highly asymmetric size ratios. Results for partial pair
correlation functions show good agreement with simulation data.Comment: 8 pages with 4 figure
Capillary Condensation and Interface Structure of a Model Colloid-Polymer Mixture in a Porous Medium
We consider the Asakura-Oosawa model of hard sphere colloids and ideal
polymers in contact with a porous matrix modeled by immobilized configurations
of hard spheres. For this ternary mixture a fundamental measure density
functional theory is employed, where the matrix particles are quenched and the
colloids and polymers are annealed, i.e. allowed to equilibrate. We study
capillary condensation of the mixture in a tiny sample of matrix as well as
demixing and the fluid-fluid interface inside a bulk matrix. Density profiles
normal to the interface and surface tensions are calculated and compared to the
case without matrix. Two kinds of matrices are considered: (i) colloid-sized
matrix particles at low packing fractions and (ii) large matrix particles at
high packing fractions. These two cases show fundamentally different behavior
and should both be experimentally realizable. Furthermore, we argue that
capillary condensation of a colloidal suspension could be experimentally
accessible. We find that in case (ii), even at high packing fractions, the main
effect of the matrix is to exclude volume and, to high accuracy, the results
can be mapped onto those of the same system without matrix via a simple
rescaling.Comment: 12 pages, 9 figures, submitted to PR
Structure and phase equilibria of the Widom-Rowlinson model
The Widom-Rowlinson model plays an important role in the statistical
mechanics of second order phase transitions and yet there currently exists no
theoretical approach capable of accurately predicting both the microscopic
structure and phase equilibria. We address this issue using computer
simulation, density functional theory and integral equation theory. A detailed
study of the pair correlation functions obtained from computer simulation
motivates a closure of the Ornstein-Zernike equations which gives a good
description of the pair structure and locates the critical point to an accuracy
of 2 percent
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