6 research outputs found
Nonlinear sliding friction of adsorbed overlayers on disordered substrates
We study the response of an adsorbed monolayer on a disordered substrate
under a driving force using Brownian molecular-dynamics simulation. We find
that the sharp longitudinal and transverse depinning transitions with
hysteresis still persist in the presence of weak disorder. However, the
transitions are smeared out in the strong disorder limit. The theoretical
results here provide a natural explanation for the recent data for the
depinning transition of Kr films on gold substrate.Comment: 8 pages, 8 figs, to appear in Phys. Rev.