Simple nucleation model on curved geometries

NICOLÁS A GARCÍA; LEOPOLDO R. GÓMEZ; DANIEL A VEGA

Rio de Janeiro

Workshop; 7th FAPERJ - School The dynamics and assembly of soft structures; 2014

CBPF - ICAM-I2CAM - NSF

In this work we present a general description of nucleation and growth of two-dimensional phases lying on arbitrarily curved backgrounds. The model is based on a coarse-grained Ginzburg-Landau approach that accounts for the main energetic contributions valid a large variety of physical systems and substrate's geometries. We show how curvature modifies the critical size of the nuclei and the path towards the equilibrium phase. The mechanism of nucleation and growth is faster on regions of positive curvature, where the height of energetic barriers for nucleation is reduced due to the underlying geometry. Substrates of varying curvature originate complexities in the energy landscape for nucleation, inducing the formation of local barriers where initially propagating nuclei may become stabilized and trapped by curvature.