Competition of percolation and phase separation in a fluid of adhesive hard spheres

TL;DR

This paper uses Monte Carlo simulations to locate the critical point of adhesive hard spheres, revealing its position within the gel region and confirming its critical behavior aligns with the 3D Ising universality class.

Contribution

The study precisely locates the liquid-vapor critical point of adhesive hard spheres and verifies its critical behavior matches the 3D Ising universality class, providing new insights into phase behavior.

Findings

Critical temperature τ_c=0.1133±0.0005

Critical density ρ_c=0.508±0.01

Critical behavior consistent with 3D Ising universality class

Abstract

Using a combination of Monte Carlo techniques, we locate the liquid--vapor critical point of adhesive hard spheres. We find that the critical point lies deep inside the gel region of the phase diagram. The (reduced) critical temperature and density are $\tau_c=0.1133\pm0.0005$ and $\rho_c=0.508\pm0.01$. We compare these results with the available theoretical predictions. Using a finite-size scaling analysis, we verify that the critical behavior of the adhesive hard sphere model is consistent with that of the 3D Ising universality class.