Physics – Condensed Matter – Statistical Mechanics
Scientific paper
2004-12-30
Physics
Condensed Matter
Statistical Mechanics
9 pages, 2 figures
Scientific paper
We introduce the concept of stationary metastable states (SMS's) in the presence of another more stable state. The stationary nature allows us to study SMS's by using a restricted partition function formalism as advocated by Penrose and Lebowitz and requires continuing the free energy. The formalism ensures that SMS free energy satisfies the requirement of thermodynamic stability everywhere including T=0, but need not represent a pysically observable metastable state over the range where the entropy under continuation becomes negative. We consider a 1-dimensional m-component axis-spin model involving only nearest-neighbor interactions, which is solved exactly. The high-temperature expansion of the model representys a polymer problem in which m acts as the activity of a loop formation. We follow deGennes and trerat m as a real variable. A thermodynamic phase transition occurs in the model for m<1. The analytic continuation of the high-temperature disordered phase free energy below the transition represents the free energy of the metastable state. The calculation shows that the notion of SMS is not necessaily a consequence of only mean-field analysis or requires long-range interactions.
No associations
LandOfFree
Stationary Metastability in an Exact Non-Mean Field Calculation for a Model without Long-Range Interactions does not yet have a rating. At this time, there are no reviews or comments for this scientific paper.
If you have personal experience with Stationary Metastability in an Exact Non-Mean Field Calculation for a Model without Long-Range Interactions, we encourage you to share that experience with our LandOfFree.com community. Your opinion is very important and Stationary Metastability in an Exact Non-Mean Field Calculation for a Model without Long-Range Interactions will most certainly appreciate the feedback.
Profile ID: LFWR-SCP-O-45441