Surface and size effect on fluctuations correlation in nanoparticles with long-range order

TL;DR

This paper develops analytical expressions for the correlation functions of order parameter fluctuations in 3D-confined nanosystems, considering surface and size effects, which are crucial for interpreting experimental scattering and magnetic resonance data.

Contribution

It introduces a phenomenological approach to derive correlation functions for nanoparticles of arbitrary shape, accounting for surface energy effects, extending bulk theories to nanoscale systems.

Findings

Derived analytical expressions for correlation functions in nanoparticles.

Revealed differences between nanoscale and bulk fluctuation behaviors.

Established limits of phenomenological theory applicability for nanosystems.

Abstract

Surface and size effect on the order parameter fluctuations and critical phenomena in the intensively studied 3D-confined nanosized systems with long-range order was not considered theoretically, while the calculations for bulk samples and thick films were performed long ago. Since widely used magnetic resonance, diffraction and scattering methods collect information about both macro- and nanosystems via the structural factors, which are directly related with fluctuations correlator, analytical expressions for the correlation function of the order parameter fluctuations seem extremely necessary for quantitative analyses of the experimental data broad spectrum. In the letter we solve the vital problem within Landau-Ginzburg-Devonshire phenomenological approach for the particles of arbitrary shape and consider concrete examples of the spherical and cylindrical ferroic nanoparticles. Allowing for the strong surface energy contribution, analytical expressions derived for Ornstein-Zernike correlator of the long-range order parameter fluctuations in 3D-confined system, dynamic generalized susceptibility, relaxation times and correlation radii discrete spectrum are principally different from those known for bulk system. Besides the great importance of the fluctuations correlation function for the analyses of scattering and magnetic resonance experimental spectra, proposed expression for fluctuations strength defines the fundamental limit of phenomenological theory applicability for 3D-confined nanosystems.