A surface tension study of liquid threads

According to symmetry of liquid threads, definitions of surface tension in axial direction and angular direction are given. The formulas of surface tension in axial direction γ_z and surface tension in angular direction γ_θ are derived. A scheme to calculate Δγ = γ_z − γ_θ is designed. We investigate seven different systems (the numbers of molecules N are 1600, 2240, 2880,3360,4000,4800 and 5280) by molecular dynamics simulations. For liquid threads, Δγ increases with the decreasing radius of dividing surface. It shows that there exists surface tension anisotropy for liquid threads. The results obtained by molecular dynamics simulations support that surface tension is dependent on the dividing surface curvature.     

Dependence of thermodynamic properties of model systems on some dissipative particle dynamics parameters

The influence of systematic perturbation of input interaction parameters on thermodynamic equilibrium properties is studied employing dissipative particle dynamics (DPD) simulations. The values of both the excess pressure and the surface tension are found to be very sensitive to the values of the soft repulsion parameter between unlike DPD particles for high values of the coarse-graining level (number of water molecules per DPD particle). For the case in which a molecular surfactant is present at the interface we have determined the dependence of these properties on the values of the parameters that characterize the bonding force between polymer beads. No significant differences were found between linear and branched surfactants.     

A new method for the determination of surface tension from molecular dynamics simulations applied to liquid droplets

For the determination of surface tension of liquid droplets by molecular dynamics simulations, the most time-consuming part is the calculation of pressure tensor in the transition layer, which makes it difficult to enhance the precision of the computation. A new method for the calculation of surface tension of liquid droplets to reduce the calculation quantity of pressure tensor in transition layer to the minimum is proposed in this paper. Two thousand particles are taken as example to show how to carry out our scheme.     

A molecular dynamics study of uranyl hydration

Molecular dynamics calculations were carried out in order to investigate the hydration structure of uranyl in aqueous solution. The CF1 model of flexible water molecules is used. This model allows one to investigate a hydrolysis reaction for water molecules in the first uranyl hydration shell. Charge redistribution effects on hydrolysis products are also taken into account. We found five ligands in uranyl hydration shell, which is of bipyramidal pentacoordinated structure. The charge redistribution effects resulted in ligands of four water molecules and one hydroxyl, which was found closer to uranium than the other ligands.     

A molecular dynamics study on iridium

In this study, molecular dynamics simulations are performed by using a modified form of Morse potential function in the framework of the Embedded Atom Method (EAM). Temperature-and pressure-dependent behaviours of bulk modulus, second-order elastic constants (SOEC), and the linear-thermal expansion coefficient is calculated and compared with the available experimental data. The melting temperature is estimated from 3 different plots. The obtained results are in agreement with the available experimental findings for iridium.      

液膜气泡法测洗涤溶液的表面张力系数

利用自制装置采用液膜气泡法测定了洗涤溶液的表面张力系数．由医用注射器充气形成球形液泡，通过与之连通的微压计测出液泡内外的压强差，运用杨氏-普拉斯方程计算出洗涤溶液的表面张力系数.     

Effects of surface tension on the dynamics of a single micro bubble near a rigid wall in an ultrasonic field

Acoustic cavitation is a very important hydrodynamic phenomenon, and is often implicated in a myriad of industrial, medical, and daily living applications. In these applications, the effect mechanism of liquid surface tension on improving the efficiency of acoustic cavitation is a crucial concern for researchers. In this study, the effects of liquid surface tension on the dynamics of an ultrasonic driven bubble near a rigid wall, which could be the main mechanism of efficiency improvement in the applications of acoustic cavitation, were investigated at the microscale level. A synchronous high-speed microscopic imaging method was used to clearly record the temporary evolution of single acoustic cavitation bubble in the liquids with different surface tension. Meanwhile, the bubble dynamic characteristics, such as the position and time of bubble collapse, the size and stability of the bubbles, the speed of bubble boundaries and the micro-jets, were analyzed and compared. In the case of the single bubbles near a rigid wall, it was found that low surface tension reduces the stability of the bubbles in the liquid medium. Meanwhile, the bubbles collapse earlier and farther from the rigid wall in the liquids with lower surface tension. In addition, the surface tension has no significant influence on the speed of the first micro-jet, but it can substantially increase the speed of second and the third micro-jets after the first collapse of the bubble. These effects of liquid surface tension on the bubble dynamics can explain the mechanism of surfactants in numerous fields of acoustic cavitation for facilitating its optimization and application.     

Investigation of surface properties of liquid transition metals: Surface tension and surface entropy

In the present study, surface properties namely surface tension and surface entropy of liquid transition metals have been reported. The surface entropy of liquid Fe, Co and Ni metals has been investigated using the expression derived by Gosh et al. [R.C. Gosh, A.Z. Ziauddin Ahmed, G.M. Bhuiyan, Eur. Phys. J. B 56 (2007) 177]. To describe interionic interaction the pseudopotential approach has been used and radial distribution functions have been determined from the solution of Ornstein-Zernike integral equation. The calculated values of surface tension and surface entropy agree well with experiment. The present study shows that the expression derived by Gosh et al. leads to a good estimation for the surface entropy.     

不同润湿性石英表面吸附页岩油的分子动力学模拟

根据吉木萨尔凹陷芦草沟组储层特征,利用分子动力学方法研究了不同润湿性石英狭缝表面吸附页岩油的特征.用甲基和羟基按照-CH₃:-OH=100:0、 75:25、 50:50、 25:75、 0:100修饰石英表面以构造不同润湿性的表面,并构建10 nm裂缝模型,以研究其对C₁₅H₃₂页岩油的吸附特性.研究结果表明,通过调节修饰官能团的比例,成功构造了润湿角为122.0°、 116.5°、 92.5°、 82.6°、 65.4°的吸附模型.由于水分子与石英表面间的相互作用能变化剧烈,水分子在修饰的石英表面的吸附是导致润湿角不断改变的主要原因.(C₁₅H₃₂在甲基改性石英表面的第一吸附层峰值是羟基改性的石英表面的1.37倍,说明润湿性会导致吸附特征发生明显改变.)通过对游离态页岩油含量的计算发现,随着羟基改性程度的增加,游离态页岩油质量占比从68%逐渐增长到83.7%,说明表面的润湿性改造有利于页岩油的解吸进而提高页岩油开发能力.     

Surface effect on the coalescence of Pt clusters: A molecular dynamics study

We have performed molecular dynamics simulations for Pt_N + Pt_N → Pt_2N (N = 147, 324, 500,792), to investigate the effect of size and substrate on coalescence temperature. Our simulations show that platinum nanoclusters coalesce at the temperatures lower than the cluster melting point. The difference between coalescence and melting temperatures decreases with the increase in cluster size and presence of substrate. These thermal behaviors affect catalytical properties of nanoclusters and the substrate, as an environment, has major effect on activity of metal nanoclusters.     

Void effect on mechanical properties of copper nanosheets under biaxial tension by molecular dynamics method

The relationship between void size/location and mechanical behavior under biaxial loading of copper nanosheets containing voids are investigated by molecular dynamics method. The void location and the void radius on the model are discussed in the paper. The main reason of break is discovered by the congruent relationship between the shear stress and its dislocations. Dislocations are nucleated at the corner of system and approached to the center of void with increased deformation. Here, a higher stress is required to fail the voided sheets when smaller voids are utilized. The void radius influences the time of destruction. The larger the void radius is, the lower the shear stress and the earlier the model breaks. The void location impacts the dislocation distribution.     

A variable charge molecular dynamics study of the initial stage of nickel oxidation

The oxidation of nickel single crystals is investigated by using variable charge molecular dynamics. The simulations are performed on three nickel low-index surfaces ((1 0 0), (1 1 0) and (1 1 1)) at temperatures between 300 K and 950 K. The results show that the shape of the oxidation kinetics is independent of the crystallographic orientation and the temperature under the present conditions. The oxide thin film grows according to an island growth mode, this initial stage of oxidation can be divided in three steps: (i) the dissociative chemisorption step (ii) the oxide island nucleation and (iii) the lateral growth of the island. The first step is slowdown/speedup by the surface orientation and temperature. Finally, the simulations show the onset of an oxide layer.     

The surface tension of liquid Cu-Fe-Sb alloys

The results of study on the influence of temperature and iron and antimony on the surface tension of liquid ternary Cu-Fe-Sb systems are presented. The measurements were carried out with the sessile drop method, in a broad range of the alloy additions concentration (Fe and Sb). It was demonstrated that the surface tension varies as a linear function of temperature and concentration of iron. It was also demonstrated that antimony, in examined alloys, shows the properties characteristic of a surface-active substance, significantly reducing the surface tension value. The changes of the surface tensions as a function of concentration of antimony were described with the Szyszkowski's equation. Composition of surface layer, enriched with an antimony, was determined basing on the model, which used data regarding properties of binary systems. The surface tension values of Cu-Fe-Sb systems was also computed from model and compared with experimental data. A good agreement was obtained.     

Estimating critical surface tension from droplet spreading area

Critical surface tension (CST) is a measure of solid surface tension and is mainly determined by measuring the contact angle of a droplet on a target solid surface. The concept of CST makes it possible to determine solid surface tension without any unprovable assumptions such as the Fowkes hypothesis. However, it requires somewhat special devices and skills for measuring the contact angle. In this work, we propose a simple method to determine the CST of a solid by measuring the droplet spreading area. This method is developed by combining the conventional CST with a simple analytical droplet model. The difference in estimated CSTs between our method and the conventional one is within 3.0%. Our method enables a quick and simple evaluation of the solid surface tension without special devices for measuring the contact angle.     

Influence of line defects on relaxation properties of graphene: A molecular dynamics study

The relaxation properties of single layer graphene sheets containing line defects were investigated using molecular dynamics simulation with AIROBE bond-order interatomic potential. The dynamic evolution of graphene sheets during relaxation condition was analyzed. The simulation results show that the single layer graphene sheets are not perfectly flat in an ideal state, and the graphene sheet shows a significant corrugations at the verge of sheet. The graphene sheet is bent with the line defects at the end of the sheet, and the extent of this bend also increases with the increase of the defect number. Furthemore, the graphene sheet transforms into a paraboloid with the line defects at the middle of the sheet.     

A comprehensive molecular dynamics study of a single polystyrene chain in a good solvent

In this study, molecular characteristics of polystyrene (PS) was calculated measuring its dilute-solution properties in toluene at 288.15 K via molecular dynamics (MD) simulations. The solution models consisted of PS chains with different number of repeating units all of which were in a dilute regime. In order to investigate the compatibility between the polymer and the solvent molecules, interaction energy and Flory-Huggins (FH) interaction parameter were estimated. The simulation results indicate that increasing the chain repeating units enhanced the interaction between the solute and the solvent. Additionally, the chain dimensions were evaluated calculating the radius of gyration (R_g) and end-to-end distance, r0. To determine the dynamic behavior of the chains in the solutions, mean square displacement (MSD) and diffusivity coefficient were calculated. The simulation results indicated that the chain rigidity at low molecular weight and chain flexibility with increasing the molecular weight influenced chains dynamic behavior and diffusivity. Moreover, radial distribution function (RDF) illustrated the effect of steric hindrance of the chains in dilute solution on capturing the solvent molecules. In addition, solution viscosity was calculated by performing non-equilibrium molecular dynamics simulation (NEMD). The obtained results of chain characteristics and viscosity showed a good agreement with experimental results published previously. This agreement confirms the accuracy of the applied simulation method to characterize the dilute solutions and the chains characteristics.     

Effects of surface concentration on the porphine monolayers: Molecular simulations at the nanoscale water-gas interface

The effect of surface concentration on the structure and stability of porphine (PH₂) monolayers at the water-gas interface was studied by using molecular dynamics simulation. Five monolayer systems having different surface concentrations were investigated in order to cover a full range of the experimental π-A isotherm. The simulation results show that increment of a number of the PH₂ molecules not only affects the significantly decreasing water density at the interface but also the monolayer surface tensions. The calculated surface tensions of the five systems indicate that the monolayer phase transfer corresponding to gaseous, expanded, condensed, and collapsed phases are observed. The hydrogen bonding between water and the PH₂ molecules at the interface plays an important role on the monolayer film formation, especially at the lower surface concentrations. The PH₂ orientations for all surface concentrations, except the highest one, are favored to be the β-structure as observed in the copper porphyrazine (CuPz) monolayer.     

A molecular dynamics study of structural transition of Ti during the rapid quenching process

The structural transitions of Ti during two different quenching processes (Q1: 7.5×10¹¹ K/s, Q2: 2.0×10¹⁴ K/s) were studied using molecular dynamics simulations. The calculated pair-correlation function agrees acceptably with available experimental data. This work gives the structural properties, including the variations with temperature of pair-correlation function, bond-angle distribution function, bond pairs and Voronoi indices, in both rapid quenching processes. Our results indicated that the liquid Ti transformed to hcp phase at the temperature about of 400 K under the quenching condition Q1 while the liquid Ti was frozen into a glass state at the temperature about of 800 K under the quenching condition Q2.