Early time wetting kinetics in surface-directed spinodal decomposition for off-critical quenches: A molecular dynamics study.

Abstract

We present results from the molecular dynamics simulation of surface-directed spinodal decomposition in binary fluid mixtures (A + B) with off-critical compositions. The aim is to elucidate the role of composition ratio in the early time wetting kinetics under the influence of long-range surface potential. In our simulations, the attractive part of surface potential varies as V(z) = -ϵa/zn, with ϵa being the surface-potential strength. The surface prefers the "A" species to form the wetting layer. Its thickness [R1(t)] for the majority wetting (number of A-type particles [NA] > number of B-type particles [NB]) grows as a power-law with an exponent of 1/(n + 2). This is consistent with the early time kinetics in the form of potential-dependent growth present in the Puri-Binder model. However, for minority wetting (NA < NB), the growth exponent in R1(t) is less than 1/(n + 2). Furthermore, on decreasing the field strength ϵa, we recover 1/(n + 2) for a minority wetting case. We provide phenomenological arguments to explain the early time wetting kinetics for both cases.