Condensation of One-Component Plasmas and Plasma Dust

摘要

The method of molecular dynamics has been used to study phase transitions of one-component plasmas and plasma dust. A range of measures, including the newly devised topological entropy of Voronoi diagrams and biharmonic interpolation of particle movements, are used in the study. The fact, that plasma dust is far more difficult to condense than one-component plasmas, is attributed to the increased entropy, which is evident from e.g. the lack of lattice waves of dust arrays. This observation may prove useful in understanding many models of phase transitions.