Parity Breaking at Faceted Crystal Growth Fronts during Ice Templating

TL;DR

This paper uses phase-field simulations to understand how parity breaking influences the growth direction of lamellar ice structures during ice templating, providing a theoretical framework for experimental observations.

Contribution

It introduces a theoretical model explaining the selection of growth direction via spontaneous parity breaking in ice templating.

Findings

Quantitative predictions for lamellae tilt angles.

Identification of parity breaking as a key mechanism.

Provides a basis for interpreting experimental data.

Abstract

Directional solidification of water-based solutions has emerged as a versatile technique to template hierarchical porous materials, but this nonequilibrium process remains incompletely understood. Here we use phase-field simulations to shed light on the mechanism that selects the growth direction of the lamellar ice structure that templates those materials. Our results show that this selection can be understood within the general framework of spontaneous parity breaking, yielding quantitative predictions for the tilt angle of lamellae with respect to the thermal axis. The results provide a theoretical basis to interpret a wide range of experimental observations.