Journal
PROCEEDINGS OF THE NATIONAL ACADEMY OF SCIENCES OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
Volume 112, Issue 22, Pages 6925-6930Publisher
NATL ACAD SCIENCES
DOI: 10.1073/pnas.1500763112
Keywords
Kibble-Zurek mechanism; nonequilibrium dynamics; spontaneous symmetry breaking; KTHNY theory; colloids
Categories
Funding
- German Research Foundation [KE 1168/8-1]
Ask authors/readers for more resources
The Kibble-Zurek mechanism describes the evolution of topological defect structures like domain walls, strings, and monopoles when a system is driven through a second-order phase transition. The model is used on very different scales like the Higgs field in the early universe or quantum fluids in condensed matter systems. A defect structure naturally arises during cooling if separated regions are too far apart to communicate (e.g., about their orientation or phase) due to finite signal velocity. This lack of causality results in separated domains with different (degenerated) locally broken symmetry. Within this picture, we investigate the non-equilibrium dynamics in a condensed matter analog, a 2D ensemble of colloidal particles. In equilibrium, it obeys the so-called Kosterlitz-Thouless- Halperin-Nelson-Young (KTHNY) melting scenario with continuous (second order-like) phase transitions. The ensemble is exposed to a set of finite cooling rates covering roughly three orders of magnitude. Along this process, we analyze the defect and domain structure quantitatively via video microscopy and determine the scaling of the corresponding length scales as a function of the cooling rate. We indeed observe the scaling predicted by the Kibble-Zurek mechanism for the KTHNY universality class.
Authors
I am an author on this paper
Click your name to claim this paper and add it to your profile.
Reviews
Recommended
No Data Available