MONTE-CARLO AND MEAN-FIELD STUDIES OF SUCCESSIVE PHASE-TRANSITIONS IN ROD MONOLAYERS

Citation:

Kramer, D. ; Benshaul, A. ; CHEN, Z. Y. ; Gelbart, W. M. . Monte-Carlo And Mean-Field Studies Of Successive Phase-Transitions In Rod Monolayers. JOURNAL OF CHEMICAL PHYSICS 1992, 96, 2236-2252.

Date Published:

FEB 1

תקציר:

In this paper we present a rigid-rod model (involving a restricted set of orientations) which is solved first with mean-field theory and then by Monte Carlo simulation. It is shown that both interparticle attractions and anisotropic adsorption energies are necessary in order for two successive fluid-fluid transitions to occur. The first is basically a gas-liquid condensation of ‘‘lying down’’ rods in the plane of the surface, and the second involves a ‘‘standing up’’ of the particles. A close qualitative correspondence is established between the results obtained in the mean-field and Monte Carlo descriptions. The role of biaxial states, i.e., in-plane orientational ordering, is also discussed in both contexts. To this end, we develop an analogy between our one-component rod monolayer and a bidisperse system of interconverting isotropic particles.