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Spontaneous liquid-liquid phase separation of water
Takuma Yagasaki1, Masakazu Matsumoto1, Hideki Tanaka1
1Department of Chemistry, Faculty of Science, Okayama University, 3-1-1 Tsushima-naka, Kitaku, Okayama, 700-8530, Japan.
Abstract:
We report a molecular dynamics simulation demonstrating a fast spontaneous liquid-liquid phase separation of water and a subsequent slow crystallization to ice. It is found that supercooled water separates rapidly into low- and high-density domains so as to reduce the surface energy in the rectangular simulation cell at certain thermodynamic states. The liquid-liquid phase separation, which is about two orders of magnitude faster than the crystallization, suggests a possibility to observe this phenomenon experimentally.
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