Related Experiment Video
Updated: Nov 5, 2025

Orientational Transition in a Liquid Crystal Triggered by the Thermodynamic Growth of Interfacial Wetting Sheets
Published on: May 15, 2017
Two Liquid-Liquid Phase Transitions in Confined Water Nanofilms
Saeed Pourasad1, Amir Hajibabaei1, Chang Woo Myung1
1Center for Superfunctional Materials, Department of Chemistry, and Department of Physics, Ulsan National Institute of Science and Technology (UNIST), 50 UNIST-gil, Ulsan 44919, Republic of Korea.
Abstract:
The stories behind supercooled bulk and confined water can be different. Bulk water has a metastable liquid-liquid phase transition at deeply supercooled conditions, but the existence of such a phenomenon in confined water is in question. Herein we show simulation results of first-order phase transitions between high- and low-density liquid (HDL and LDL) in confined water in both positive and negative pressures. A mid-density state between these two local states appears, which lets the transition show the hysteresis loop with transiently stable intermediate states. On the basis of Landau theory that we have adapted for mixing of moieties with high- and low-density states, we explain the phase transitions with the order parameter-dependent free energy change which is governed by second- to higher-order interactions among those moieties.
Related Concept Videos
Phase Diagrams
Phase Diagram
Phase Transitions
Phase Transitions: Vaporization and Condensation
Phase Transitions: Melting and Freezing
States of Water
Water freezes when the intermolecular forces are greater than the kinetic energy. Unlike most other substances, water is less dense in its solid state than in its liquid state. This is because each water molecule can form...

