Dynamical test of phase transition order
- 10 April 1989
- journal article
- research article
- Published by American Physical Society (APS) in Physical Review Letters
- Vol. 62 (15) , 1764-1767
- https://doi.org/10.1103/physrevlett.62.1764
Abstract
The dynamics of the interface between an ordered phase, characterized by an order parameter, ψ, and a disordered phase where ψ=0 provide a promising, powerful tool to distinguish between continuous or second-order and weakly first-order phase transitions. We apply this idea to the nematic–smectic-A transition and find that this transition is weakly first order even when the latent heat is too small to measure.Keywords
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