Effect of the external energy flux on phase separation of binary mixtures - art. no. 024101

We investigate the phase separation kinetics of binary mixtures with the in clusion of external energy flux. The morphology and growth kinetics of doma ins are governed by the competition between thermally driven diffusion dyna mics and externally imposed exchange dynamics. For thermally driven diffusi ons over nearest-neighboring sites, diagonal oriented interfaces become pre ferable due to the instability of horizontal and vertical interfaces. For d iffusions over next-nearest-neighboring sites, horizontal and vertical inte rfaces will become dominant. Interestingly, we find that the domain coarsen ing is accelerated because of the high interface tensions and the interfaci al roughness in the presence of external fluctuations, while the coarsening of domains with horizontal or vertical facets is slower than that with til ted interfaces because horizontal or vertical interfaces contain lower inte rfacial tensions than diagonally oriented ones.