Static and dynamic properties of supercooled water in small nanotubes

The static and dynamic properties of water in small silicon-carbide and carbon nanotubes have been studied over the temperature range 100 K-298 K, using extensive molecular dynamics simulations. The computed properties include the radial distribution function, the cage correlation function, the space-time autocorrelation function, the velocity autocorrelation function, and the self-diffusivity. They all indicate that, under the conditions that we study, water does not freeze in small nanotubes; the Stokes-Einstein relation breaks down, and the self-diffusivity exhibits a transition around 230 K, very close to 228 K, the temperature at which a fragile-to-strong dynamic crossover is supposed to happen. The cage correlation function C(t) decays according to a stretched-exponential function, C(t) ∼ exp[ - (t/τ)(β)], where τ is a relaxation time and β is a topological exponent.