Critical behavior of interacting monomers adsorbed on one-dimensional channels arranged in a triangular cross-sectional structure: Mixed interactions along and across the channels

P. M. PASINETTI; F. ROMÁ; J. L. RICCARDO; A. J. RAMIREZ-PASTOR

JOURNAL OF CHEMICAL PHYSICS

American Institute of Physics

Lugar: USA; Año: 2010 vol. 132 p. 54111 - 54117

0021-9606

Monte Carlo simulations and finite-size scaling analysis have been carried out to study the critical behavior in a submonolayer lattice-gas which mimics a nanoporous environment. In this model, the adsorbent is modeled as one-dimensional channels of equivalent adsorption sites arranged in a triangular cross-sectional structure. Two kinds of lateral interaction energies have been considered: (1) wL interaction energy between nearest-neighbor particles adsorbed along a single channel and (2) wT interaction energy between particles adsorbed across nearest-neighbor channels. We focus on the case of repulsive transverse (wT > 0) and attractive longitudinal (wL > 0) lateral interactions, where a rich variety of structural orderings are observed in the adlayer depending on the value of the parameters k_B T/w_T (being k_B the Boltzmann constant and w_L/w_T). The results reveal the existence of a first-order phase transition in the adlayer between a low-temperature “condensed” phase and a high-temperature “disordered” phase.