Phase Transitions, Critical Phenomena, and Instabilities
1981; American Association for the Advancement of Science; Volume: 211; Issue: 4478 Linguagem: Inglês
10.1126/science.211.4478.125
ISSN1095-9203
Autores Tópico(s)Advanced Thermodynamics and Statistical Mechanics
ResumoTransformations among many of the diverse states of matter arise from microscopic interactions involving very many (approximately 10(23)) constituent particles and result in dramatic changes in macroscopic properties. The values of some physical parameters vanish, while others approach infinity. These changes and their evolution are strikingly similar in systems as apparently different as liquids, magnets, superconductors, ferroelectrics, and liquid crystals, which suggests that there is an underlying unity to phase transition phenomena. The basis and extent of this unity are reviewed for many-body systems in equilibrium, and analogies with instability phenomena in systems far from equilibrium (such as lasers, fluid flows, and avalanche electronic devices) are pointed out.
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