Regensburg 2002 – wissenschaftliches Programm

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PV: Plenarvorträge

PV V

PV V: Plenarvortrag

Mittwoch, 13. März 2002, 08:30–09:15, H1

Do we understand crystal nucleation? — •Daan Frenkel — FOM Institute for Atomic and Molecular Physics, Amsterdam, NL

Classical Nucleation Theory dates back to the 1920’s and has been the standard tool to predict and interpret experiments on (crystal) nucleation. It is now becoming possible to compute absolute nucleation rates directly by computer simulation, even when the actual rates are as low as one nucleus per cubic centimeter per month! However, simulations of crystal nucleation in colloidal suspensions yield quite unexpected results. In my talk, I shall review what simulation tells us about the pathway for entropic crystallization - the phenomenon by which (colloidal) particles organize into regular crystals in the absence of any attractive interactions. Moreover, by studying the early stages of nucleation we come to the counterintuitive conclusion that, sometimes, the barrier for nucleation increases, rather than decreases, with supersaturation. This has important consequences for the structure of colloidal glasses.