Entropy and phase diagram of valence transition

The electronic and lattice entropies associated with the valence transition are estimated. The electronic entropy in metallic phase is evaluated based on the model which includes the mixing between ?-level and d-band states, and the d-band superimposes the hybridized ?-level. The quasiharmonic approximation together with the Debye approximation are used to calculate the lattice entropy. For the first order transition occurring at low temperature the entropy of semiconducting phase is found to be lower than that of metallic phase. The reverse situation is obtained for high transition temperature. This explains the experimental fact that the slope of the phase boundary of valence transition in SmS changes its sign with temperature. The specific heat calculated in this model shows a broad maximum at low temperature.     

Superfluid phase transition in trapped atomic Fermi gas

Superfluid phase transition in an atomic Fermi gas confined to a harmonic trap is studied. The critical transition temperature and the temperature dependence and spatial shape of the order parameter are determined. The spectrum and wave functions of single-particle and collective excitations are obtained for a gas in the superfluid phase. The excitation eigenfrequencies exhibit a pronounced temperature dependence, allowing, e.g., identification of the superfluid phase.     

Lower phase transition temperature of solid hydrogen sulphide

The lower phase transition temperature of solid hydrogen sulphide is measured accurately using the polarizing microscope technique. A temperature difference is observed between one phase transition and its reverse. It is suggested that this may be due to hysteresis effect in the phase transition as a result of change of structure.     

Phase transition in a self-gravitating planar gas

We consider a gas of Newtonian self-gravitating particles in two-dimensional space, finding a phase transition, with a high temperature homogeneous phase and a low temperature clumped one. We argue that the system is described in terms of a gas with fractal behaviour.     

Acoustic emission at phase transition in vanadium sesquioxide single crystals

The metal-semiconductor phase transition in vanadium sesquioxide is investigated by the acoustic emission method. It is shown that the acoustic emission in single crystals of this compound is due to thermoelastic stresses arising in the crystal upon the phase transition. Transformation of the acoustic emission activity and an increase in the phase transition temperature are revealed in the temperature cycling of the sample. Observation of peaks of the acoustic emission activity at a temperature of 5–6 K above the critical temperature indicates that crystal nuclei of the monoclinic phase appear in the high-temperature (trigonal) phase of the crystal.     

Pressure induced phase transition in PbSnTe

Hall coefficient R_H and resistivity ? for Pb_0.56Sn_0.44Te crystal were measured as a function of temperature and pressure in the region of the ferroelectric phase transition. It enabled to obtain the pressure dependence of the phase transition temperature. Analysis of the experimental data showed that the lattice anharmonicity gives the dominant contribution to the phase transition mechanism.     

Phase transition in diserine sulfate monohydrate crystals

The temperature dependences of the real and imaginary parts of the complex permittivity of diserine sulfate monohydrate crystals and of their electrical response in different crystallographic directions to a change in temperature are investigated. It is confirmed that these crystals undergo a first-order phase transition in the temperature range 260–270 K. This phase transition is assumed to originate from the freezing of the orientational degrees of freedom of the crystallization water molecules involved in these crystals.     

Lamellar-to-nematic phase transition in a lipid-surfactant mixture

A lyotropic system, consisting of a lecithin (DMPC) and a non-ionic surfactant (C₁₂E₅) in water was studied. The system exhibits a lamellar-to-nematic phase transition. The nematic phase appears as the temperature is decreased and only exists in a very limited temperature and concentration range, for specific lipid-to-surfactant ratios. While a lamellar phase is found at higher temperatures in both mixed and pure C₁₂E₅ systems, the transition to the nematic phase at lower temperatures coincides with a micellar phase in the pure C₁₂E₅ system. The transition appears to be driven by the strong temperature dependence of the surfactant film spontaneous curvature. The structural properties of the lamellar phase close to the lamellar-to-nematic boundary have been studied by polarised light microscopy and small-angle neutron and X-ray scattering experiments. The signature of a helical defect with Burgers vector of magnitude 2 is apparent in our data, close to the lamellar-to-nematic phase transition. The proliferation of screw dislocations in the lamellar phase might be a plausible mechanism for driving this transition. Received 6 July 1999 and Received in final form 17 April 2000     

Phase transition in hot pion matter

The equation of state for the pion gas is analyzed within the third virial approximation. The second virial coefficient is found from the ππ-scattering data, while the third one is considered as a free parameter. The proposed model leads to a first-order phase transition from the pion gas to a more dense phase at the temperature T_pt<136 MeV. Due to relatively low temperature this phase transition cannot be related to the deconfinement. This suggests that a new phase of hadron matter — ‘hot pion liquid’ — may exist.     

Reentrant spin-glass transition in a dilute magnet

We perform a large-scale Monte Carlo simulation of a dilute classical Heisenberg model with ferromagnetic nearest neighbor and antiferromagnetic next-nearest neighbor interactions. We found that the model reproduces a reentrant spin-glass transition. That is, as the temperature is decreased, the magnetization increases rapidly below a certain temperature, reaches a maximum value, and then disappears at some lower temperature. The low temperature phase was suggested to be a spin-glass phase that is characterized by ferromagnetic clusters.     

Swollen-collapsed transition in random hetero-polymers

A lattice model of a hetero-polymer with random hydrophilic-hydrophobic charges interacting with the solvent is introduced, whose continuum counterpart has been proposed by Garel, Leibler and Orland [#!GLO!#]. The transfer matrix technique is used to study various constrained annealed systems which approximate at various degrees of accuracy the original quenched model. For highly hydrophobic chains an ordinary -point transition is found from a high temperature swollen phase to a low temperature compact phase. Depending on the type of constrained averages, at very low temperatures a swollen phase or a coexistence between compact and swollen phases are found. The results are carefully compared with the corresponding ones obtained in the continuum limit, and various improvements in the original calculations are discussed. Received: 10 April 1998 / Revised: 4 June 1998 / Accepted: 1st July 1998     

Driven spin wave modes in XY ferromagnet: non-equilibrium phase transition

The dynamical responses of XY ferromagnet driven by linearly polarised propagating and standing magnetic field wave have been studied by Monte Carlo simulation in three dimensions. In the case of propagating magnetic field wave (with specified amplitude, frequency and the wavelength), the low temperature dynamical mode is a propagating spin wave and the system becomes structureless (or random) in the high temperature. A dynamical symmetry breaking phase transition is observed at a finite (non-zero) temperature. This symmetry breaking is confirmed by studying the statistical distribution of the angle of the spin vector. The dynamic non-equilibrium transition temperature was found to decrease as the amplitude of the propagating magnetic field wave increased. A comprehensive phase boundary is drawn in the plane formed by temperature and amplitude of propagating field wave. The phase boundary was observed to shrink (in the low temperature side) for longer wavelength of the propagating magnetic wave. In the case of standing magnetic field wave, the low temperature excitation is a standing spin wave which becomes structureless (or random) in the high temperature. Here also, like the case of propagating magnetic wave, a dynamical symmetry breaking non-equilibrium phase transition was observed. A comprehensive phase boundary was drawn. Unlike the case of propagating magnetic wave, the phase boundary does not show any systematic variation with the wavelength of the standing magnetic field wave. In the limit of vanishingly small amplitude of the field, the phase boundaries approach the recent Monte Carlo estimate of equilibrium transition temperature.     

TTF-TCNQ的Peierls相变研究

根据建立在电子-声子相互作用基础上的Peierls相变理论，利用形变势模型和半经验晶体轨道方法计算的能带结构数据，对一维有机导体TTF-TCNQ的Peierls相变温度进行了计算，结果表明,TTF链的相变温度低于TCNQ链的相变温度，从而说明前者的电子-声子耦合相互作用比后者要弱,TTF-TCNQ在54K的金属-绝缘体相变主要发生在TCNQ链上. 关键词： 一维有机导体 Peierls相变温度 电子-声子相互作用     

Pressure-induced magnetic transition in EuSe

The weak field a.c. susceptibility of EuSe was measured as functions of temperature from 1.5 to 15 K and of hydrostatic pressure up to 15 kbar. The Néel temperature did not change with pressure, and a new pressure-induced ferromagnetic phase appeared in the region above 4.6 K and above 4.5 kbar (triple point).     

Phase transition in gauge theories

In this short review we present the consequences of the spontaneously broken gauge theories will lead to when describing matter at high temperature and density. It appears various phase transitions should occur leading to the restoration of symmetry at high temperature of the originally broken one. Symmetry behaviour in external magnetic fields and in the early universe has been briefly mentioned.     

Configurational entropy-induced phase transition in spinel LiMn2O4

The spinel-type LiMn$_{2}$O$_{4}$ is a promising candidate as cathode material for rechargeable Li-ion batteries due to its good thermal stability and safety. Experimentally, it is observed that in this compound there occur the structural phase transitions from cubic ($Fd\bar{3}m)$ to tetragonal ($I4_{1}/{amd}$) phase at slightly below room temperature. To understand the phase transition mechanism, we compare the Gibbs free energy between cubic phase and tetragonal phase by including the configurational entropy. Our results show that the configurational entropy contributes substantially to the stability of the cubic phase at room temperature due to the disordered Mn$^{3+}$/Mn$^{4+}$ distribution as well as the orientation of the Jahn-Teller elongation of the Mn$^{3+}$O$_{6}$ octahedron in the the spinel phase. Meanwhile, the phase transition temperature is predicted to be 267.8 K, which is comparable to the experimentally observed temperature. These results serve as a good complement to the experimental study, and are beneficial to the improving of the electrochemical performance of LiMn$_{2}$O$_{4}$ cathode.     

On the chiral phase transition in hadronic matter

A qualitative analysis of the chiral phase transition in QCD with two massless quarks and nonzero baryon density is performed. It is assumed that, at zero baryonic density, ρ=0, the temperature phase transition is of the second order. Due to a specific power dependence of baryon masses on the chiral condensate, the phase transition becomes of the first order at the temperature T=T_ph(ρ) for ρ>0. At temperatures T_cont(ρ)> _T>_Tph(ρ), there is a mixed phase consisting of the quark phase (stable) and the hadron phase (unstable). At the temperature T=T_cont(ρ), the system experiences a continuous transition to the pure chirally symmetric phase.     

Spectroscopic manifestations of orientational phase transition in adsorbate monolayer

In the framework of the virtual crystal approximation, the temperature dependences of frequencies and integral intensities of infrared absorption spectral lines are established for an adsorbate monolayer near the point of the order-to-disorder orientational phase transition. The results obtained are consistent with the experimentally observed temperature dependences of the vibrational spectra for the 2 × 1 monolayer CO/NaCl (100). For this system, the Davydov splitting does not vanish on the phase transition due to a nonzero value of the average dipole moment (unlike molecular crystals and orientationally planar monolayers in which the average dipole moment becomes zero at the phase transition temperature).     

Phase transition in the generalized Ising-Kosterlitz-Thouless model

The features of the phase transition are considered in a model that is a combination of the Ising and Kosterlitz-Thouless models. It is shown that one or two successive phase transitions may occur in such a system, depending on the relation between parameters. An asymptotic formula is derived for the Ising-type phase transition temperature.     

Order-disorder phase transition in CoPd thin films

The thin films of a CoPd alloy in the equiatomic composition region are prepared by condensation at different substrate temperatures. The substrate temperature is varied from the liquid nitrogen temperature to +280°C. At low substrate temperatures, the crystal structure of the condensed films is the single-crystal blocks of the hexagonal close-packed (hcp) phase. As the substrate temperature is further increased, the domains characterized in the initial state by the microdiffraction patterns in the form of a diffuse halo appear in the films, and these domains have a clear-cut boundary with the regions indicated by point reflections in the electron diffraction patterns. At substrate temperatures from +150 to 160°C, the CoPd alloy films in the equiatomic composition region are fully amorphous. The given state is a polymorphic transformation of the martensitic type. It arises in the martensitic transformation of the low-temperature hcp phase to the high-temperature fcc phase.