Irreversible Growth of a Binary Mixture Confined in a Thin Film Geometry with Competing Walls

CANDIA, JULIÁN; ALBANO, EZEQUIEL V.

PHYSICAL REVIEW LETTERS

The American Physical Society

Lugar: Ridge, NY (Estados Unidos); Año: 2002 vol. 88 p. 161031 - 161034

0031-9007

The irreversible growth of a binary mixture under far-from-equilibrium conditions is studied in threedimensional confined geometries of size Lx x Ly x Lz , where Lz >> Lx = Ly is the growing direction. A competing situation where two opposite surfaces prefer different species of the mixture is analyzed. Because of this antisymmetric condition, an interface between the different species develops along the growing direction. Such interface undergoes a localization-delocalization transition that is the precursor of a wetting transition in the thermodynamic limit. Furthermore, the growing interface also undergoes a concave-convex transition in the growth mode. So, the system exhibits a multicritical wetting point.