Simple analysis of scattering data with the Ornstein-Zernike equation.

In this paper we propose and explore a method of analysis of the scattering experimental data for uniform liquidlike systems. In our pragmatic approach we are not trying to introduce by hands an artificial small parameter to work out a perturbation theory with respect to the known results, e.g., for hard spheres or sticky hard spheres (all the more that in the agreement with the notorious Landau statement, there is no physical small parameter for liquids). Instead of it being guided by the experimental data we are solving the Ornstein-Zernike equation with a trial (variational) form of the interparticle interaction potential. To find all needed correlation functions this variational input is iterated numerically to satisfy the Ornstein-Zernike equation supplemented by a closure relation. Our method is developed for spherically symmetric scattering objects, and our numeric code is written for such a case. However, it can be extended (at the expense of more involved computations and a larger amount of required experimental input information) for nonspherical particles. What is important for our approach is that it is sufficient to know experimental data in a relatively narrow range of the scattering wave vectors (q) to compute the static structure factor in a much broader range of q. We illustrate by a few model and real experimental examples of the x-ray and neutron scattering data how the approach works.

Theory of the anomalous critical behavior for the smectic-A-hexatic transition.

We propose a theoretical explanation for the long-standing problem of the anomalous critical behavior of the heat capacity near the smectic-A-hexatic phase transition. Experiments find a large specific heat critical exponent α=0.5-0.7, which is inconsistent with a small negative value α≈-0.01 expected for the three-dimensional XY universality class. We show that most of the observed features can be explained by treating simultaneously fluctuations of the hexatic orientational and translational (positional) order parameters. Assuming that the translational correlation length ξ_{tr} is much larger than the hexatic correlation length ξ_{h}, we calculate the temperature dependence of the heat capacity in the critical region near the smectic-A-hexatic phase transition. Our results are in quantitative agreement with the calorimetric experimental data.

Experimental study of methane replacement in gas hydrate by carbon dioxide.

The process of replacement of methane molecules in clathrate hydrate by carbon dioxide is studied experimentally. The dependence of the replacement extent on the concentration of the gas mixture coexisting with the hydrate is determined. The kinetics of the replacement is governed by two relaxation modes with a characteristic time ratio of about 10.