Spin-glass charge ordering in ionic liquids
Name
PhysRevMaterials.3.055606.pdf
Description
Published version
Size
2.3 MB
Format
Unknown
Checksum (MD5)
8cdc268fbcac47af43a5f2143ee96d2b
Author(s)
Levy, Amir
McEldrew, Michael
Bazant, Martin Z
Date Issued
May 2019
Journal
Physical Review Materials
Publisher
American Physical Society (APS)
Citation
Levy, Amir et al. "Spin-glass charge ordering in ionic liquids." Physical Review Materials 3, 5 (May 2019): 055606. © 2019 American Physical Society
Version
Final published version
Abstract
Ionic liquids form intricate nanostructures, both in the bulk and near charged surfaces. We show that given the ionic positions from molecular simulations, the ionic charges minimize a "spin-glass" Hamiltonian for nearest-neighbor interactions with remarkable accuracy, for both room-temperature ionic liquids and water-in-salt electrolytes. Thus, long-range charge oscillations in ionic liquids result from positional ordering, which is maximized in ionic solids but gradually disappears with added solvent, increased temperature, or by complex molecular structures. As the electrolyte becomes more disordered, geometrical frustration in the spin-glass ground state reduces correlation lengths. Eventually, thermal fluctuations excite the system from its ground state and Poisson-Boltzmann behavior is recovered. More generally, spin-glass ordering arises in any liquid with antiferromagnetic correlations, such as molten salt or the two-dimensional vortex patterns found in superfluids and bacterial turbulence.
MIT Department
Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Physics
Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Chemical Engineering
Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Mathematics
Terms of Use
Article is made available in accordance with the publisher's policy and may be subject to US copyright law. Please refer to the publisher's site for terms of use.
Persistent DSpace Link
DOI of Published Version
https://doi.org/10.1103/physrevmaterials.3.055606
