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Quasicrystalline order and a crystal-liquid state in a soft-core fluid
A J Archer1, A M Rucklidge, E Knobloch
1Department of Mathematical Sciences, Loughborough University, Loughborough LE11 3TU, United Kingdom.
Abstract:
A two-dimensional system of soft particles interacting via a two-length-scale potential is studied. Density functional theory and Brownian dynamics simulations reveal a fluid phase and two crystalline phases with different lattice spacing. Of these the larger lattice spacing phase can form an exotic periodic state with a fraction of highly mobile particles: a crystal liquid. Near the transition between this phase and the smaller lattice spacing phase, quasicrystalline structures may be created by a competition between linear instability at one scale and nonlinear selection of the other.
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