4 research outputs found
Numerical study of domain coarsening in anisotropic stripe patterns
We study the coarsening of two-dimensional smectic polycrystals characterized
by grains of oblique stripes with only two possible orientations. For this
purpose, an anisotropic Swift-Hohenberg equation is solved. For quenches close
enough to the onset of stripe formation, the average domain size increases with
time as . Further from onset, anisotropic pinning forces similar to
Peierls stresses in solid crystals slow down defects, and growth becomes
anisotropic. In a wide range of quench depths, dislocation arrays remain mobile
and dislocation density roughly decays as , while chevron boundaries
are totally pinned. We discuss some agreements and disagreements found with
recent experimental results on the coarsening of anisotropic electroconvection
patterns.Comment: 8 pages, 11 figures. Phys. Rev E, to appea