Regular Article

Selected issues of phase-field crystal simulations

¹ Materials and Process Simulation, University of Bayreuth, Bayreuth, Germany
² Research Institute for Solid State Physics and Optics, P.O. Box 49, H-1525, Budapest, Hungary
³ BCAST, Brunel University, UB 8 3PH, Uxbridge, Middlesex, UK
⁴ Institut für Theoretische Physik II: Weiche Materie, Heinrich-Heine-Universität Düsseldorf, D-40225, Düsseldorf, Germany

^* e-mail: heike.emmerich@uni-bayreuth.de

Received: 8 June 2011
Revised: 24 August 2011
Accepted: 22 September 2011
Published online: 27 October 2011

Abstract

In this contribution our focus is on the phase-field crystal method, which can be viewed as the youngest methodology in the field of interface computation based on recent work by Elder et al. (Phys. Rev. Lett. 88, 245701 (2002)). It bridges the gap between the molecular simulation approaches and the phase-field approach by operating on diffusive time scales yet atomic length scales. Here we review the fundaments of the phase-field crystal method as well as different models established so far with the aim to capture the main features of the wide range of phase diagrams found in materials science more and more comprehensively.