Long term ordering kinetics of the two dimensional q-state Potts model

E. E. FERRERO; S. A. CANNAS

Les Houches, Francia

Otro; Les Houches Summer School: "Long-Range Interacting Systems"; 2008

Universite Joseph Fourier

We studied the non-equilibrium dynamics of the q-state Potts model in the square lattice after a quench from in¯nite temperature down to subcritical temperatures T < Tc. By means of a continuous time Monte Carlo algorithm (non-conserved order parameter dynamics), we analyzed the long term behavior of the energy and relaxation time for a wide range of quench temperatures and system sizes. For q > 4 we found the existence of different dynamical regimes, according to quench temperature range. First of all there is some characteristic temperature T* < Tc, such that for T* < T < Tc simple coarsening (Lifshitz-Allen-Cahn domain growth behavior) dominates the relaxation, except very close to Tc, where evidences of nucleation relaxation mechanisms appear. For T < T* we found that, at long time scales, the LAC relaxation is interrupted when the system gets trapped in highly symmetric metastable states with finite probability, which induce activation in the domain growth, in agreement with early predictions of Lifshitz [JETP 42, 1354 (1962)]. We found two different types of those configurations: striped states and honeycomb like structures. Finally, we found a temperature Tg