Crystal growth investigations of ice∕water interfaces from molecular dynamics simulations: Profile functions and...

Attempts to simulate crystal growth of ice from liquid water and to provide a consistent microscopic description of this process have been challenging tasks. In this paper we have adapted our previously developed molecular dynamics simulation methodology to enable the investigation of steady-state directional crystal growth∕melting of ice. Specifically, we examine ice∕water systems of the (001), (110), and (111) faces of ice Ic and the (0001), (1010), and (1120) faces of ice Ih, where the TIP4P, TIP4P-Ew, and SPC∕E water models have been utilized. The influence of different growth∕melting conditions (temperature gradients and growth velocities) is investigated. Profile functions of properties of interest across the interface are obtained from nonequilibrium steady-state simulations and provide consistent descriptions of ice∕water interfaces. The widths of the various crystallographic faces are found to increase in the apparent order Ic111, Ih0001 < Ih1010 < Ih1120 < Ic001 < Ic110. The observed growth rates were in agreement with experimental values and the possible dependence on the various faces is explored. The melting temperatures obtained with the present methodology for the different models are in good agreement with estimates from other work.