The impact of the inner structure and thermal history of planets on their observable features, such as luminosity or magnetic field, crucially depends on the poorly known heat and charge transport properties of their internal layers. The thermal and electric conductivities of different phases of water (liquid, solid, and super-ionic) occurring in the interior of ice giant planets, such as Uranus or Neptune, are evaluated from equilibrium ab initio molecular dynamics, leveraging recent progresses in the theory and data analysis of transport in extended systems. The implications of our findings on the evolution models of the ice giants are briefly discussed
We report a detailed ab initio investigation on the optical properties of ice under a wide high pressure range. The ice X phase (up to 380GPa), the theoretical proposed higher pressure phase ice XV (300GPa), as well as the ambient pressure low-temperature phase ice XI are involved. Our results show that the dispersion relations of optical properties of ice under high pressure are quite different from those under ambient pressure. Under higher pressure, there is whole tendency of blue shift in all optical properties of ice, and the energy region for optical response become broader, such as the …
We report a detailed ab initio investigation on hydrogen bonding, geometry, electronic structure, and lattice dynamics of ice under a large high pressure range, including the ice X phase (55-380GPa), the previous theoretically proposed higher-pressure phase ice XIIIM (Refs. 1-2) (380GPa), ice XV (a new structure we derived from ice XIIIM) (300-380GPa), as well as the ambient pressure low-temperature phase ice XI. Different from many other materials, the band gap of ice X is found to be increasing linearly with pressure from 55GPa up to 290GPa, the electronic density of states (DOS) shows that …
We investigated the structural and dynamical properties of a tetrahedrally coordinated crystalline ice from first principles based on density functional theory within the generalized gradient approximation with the projected augmented wave method. First, we report the structural behaviour of ice at finite temperatures based on the analysis of radial distribution functions obtained by molecular dynamics simulations. The results show how the ordering of the hydrogen bonding breaks down in the tetrahedral network of ice with entropy increase in agreement with the neutron diffraction data. We also…
We show that inducing structural softness in regular magnetoelectric (ME) multiferroics -- i.e., tuning the materials to make their structure strongly reactive to applied fields -- makes it possible to obtain very large ME effects. We present illustrative first-principles results for BiFeO3 thin films.
Recent x-ray Compton scattering experiments in ice have provided useful information about the quantum nature of the interaction between H$_2$O monomers. The hydrogen bond is characterized by a certain amount of charge transfer which could be determined in a Compton experiment. We use ab-initio simulations to investigate the hydrogen bond in H$_2$O structures by calculating the Compton profile and related quantities in three different systems, namely the water dimer, a cluster containing 12 water molecules and the ice crystal. We show how to extract estimates of the charge transfer from the Com…
Ab initio simulation of the first-order proton-ordering transition in water ice
Beijing National Laboratory for Condensed Matter Physics and Institute of Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences（中国科学院物理研究所）；School of Physics, Renmin University of China（中国人民大学物理学院）
本研究通过结合机器学习势能函数与冰规则保持的更新方法，实现了水冰中首次级质子有序转变的从头计算模拟，揭示了 83 K 处的转变特征并估计核量子效应将转变温度降至 72 K。
In order to identify and quantitatively analyze the anharmonicity of phonons relevant to the anomalous thermal expansion in the Ih phase of ice, we performed neutron inelastic scattering measurements of the phonon spectrum as a function of pressure up to 1 kbar at 225 K in deuterated ice (D2O), and as a function of temperature over 10-225 K at ambient pressure in both H2O and D2O ice. We also performed density functional theory calculations of the lattice dynamics. The anomalous expansion is quantitatively reproduced from the analysis of the neutron data as well as from the ab-initio calculati…
We report a giant thermoelectric figure of merit $ZT$ (up to 6 at 1100 K) in $n$-doped lanthanum oxysulphate LaSO. Thermoelectric coefficients are computed from ab initio bands within Bloch-Boltzmann theory in an energy-, chemical potential- and temperature-dependent relaxation time approximation. The lattice thermal conductivity is estimated from a model employing the ab initio phonon and Grüneisen-parameter spectrum. The main source of the large $ZT$ is the significant power factor which correlates with a large band complexity factor. We also suggest a possible $n$-type dopant for the materi…
Nitrogen-doped carbon nanotubes can provide reactive sites on the porphyrin-like defects. It's well known that many porphyrins have transition metal atoms, and we have explored transition metal atoms bonded to those porphyrin-like defects in N-doped carbon nanotubes. The electronic structure and transport are analyzed by means of a combination of density functional theory and recursive Green's functions methods. The results determined the Heme B-like defect (an iron atom bonded to four nitrogens) as the most stable and with a higher polarization current for a single defect. With randomly posit…
The properties of water ice at megabar pressure are characterized with ab initio computer simulations. The focus lies on the metallic Cmcm phase and its insulating distorted analogue with Pnma symmetry. Both phases were recently predicted to occur at 15.5 and 12.5 Mbar respectively [Phys. Rev. Lett. 105 (2010) 195701]. The Fermi surface of the Cmcm phase is analyzed and possibility of Fermi nesting to occur is discussed. The Wannier orbital are computed for the Pnma structure and compared to ice X. While ice X shows typical sp3 hybridization, in the Pnma structure, the orbitals are deformed an…
Molecular simulations have provided valuable insight into the microscopic mechanisms underlying homogeneous ice nucleation. While empirical models have been used extensively to study this phenomenon, simulations based on first-principles calculations have so far proven prohibitively expensive. Here, we circumvent this difficulty by using an efficient machine learning model trained on density-functional theory (DFT) energies and forces. We compute nucleation rates at atmospheric pressure, over a broad range of supercoolings, using the seeding technique and systems of up to hundreds of thousands…
Observation of hexagonal close-packed water ice at conditions in ice giant planetary interiors
CEA DAM DIF（法国原子能委员会达姆-迪费中心）；Université Paris-Saclay, CEA, Laboratoire Matière en Conditions Extrêmes（巴黎萨克雷大学、法国原子能委员会极端条件物质实验室）；Institut de Minéralogie, de Physique des Matériaux et de Cosmochimie (IMPMC), Sorbonne Université, CNRS UMR 7590, MNHN（索邦大学矿物学、材料物理与宇宙化学研究所（IMPMC），CNRS UMR 7590，自然历史博物馆）；European Synchrotron Radiation Facility（欧洲同步辐射装置）
Using Density Functional Theory and a thermodynamic model [Physical Review B 86, 134418 (2012)], in this paper, we provide an approach to systematically screen compounds of a given Heusler family to predict ones that can yield giant magnetocaloric effect driven by a first-order magneto-structural transition. We apply this approach to two Heusler series Ni$_{2-x}$Fe$_{x}$Mn$_{1+z-y}$Cu$_{y}$Sb$_{1-z}$ and Ni$_{2-x}$Co$_{x}$Mn$_{1+z-y}$Cu$_{y}$Sb$_{1-z}$, obtained by cosubstitution at Ni and Mn sites. We predict four new compounds with potentials to achieve the target properties. Our computation…
We determine the impact of electron solvation on D$_2$O structures adsorbed on Cu(111) with low temperature scanning tunneling microscopy, two-photon photoemission, and ab initio theory. UV photons generating solvated electrons lead not only to transient, but also to permanent structural changes through the rearrangement of individual molecules. The persistent changes occur near sites with a high density of dangling OH groups that facilitate electron solvation. We conclude that energy dissipation during solvation triggers permanent molecular rearrangement via vibrational excitation.
The ab initio full-potential linearized augmented plane-wave method explicitly designed for the slab geometry was employed to elucidate the physical origin of the layer potentials for the trilayers nFe/3Cr/nFe(001), where n is the number of Fe monolayers. The thickness of the transition-metal ferromagnet has been ranged from $n=1$ up to n=8 while the spacer thickness was fixed to 3 monolayers. The calculated potentials were inserted in the Fuchs-Sondheimer formalism in order to calculate the giant magnetoresistance (GMR) ratio. The predicted GMR ratio was compared with the experiment and the o…
Water and hydrogen at high pressure make up a substantial fraction of the interiors of giant planets. Using ab initio random structure search methods we investigate the ground-state crystal structures of water, hydrogen, and hydrogen-oxygen compounds. We find that, at pressures beyond 14 Mbar, excess hydrogen is incorporated into the ice phase to form a novel structure with H4O stoichiometry. We also predict two new ground state structures, P2_1/m and I4/mmm, for post-C2/m water ice.
The structural and magnetic properties of functional Ni-Mn-Z (Z = Ga, In, Sn) Heusler alloys are studied by first-principles and Monte Carlo methods. The \textit{ab initio} calculations give a basic understanding of the underlying physics which is associated with the strong competition of ferro- and antiferromagnetic interactions with increasing chemical disorder. The resulting $d$-electron orbital dependent magnetic ordering is the driving mechanism of magnetostructural instability which is accompanied by a drop of magnetization governing the size of the magnetocaloric effect. The thermodynam…
Nano-structures with giant magnetocrystalline anisotropy energies (MAE) are desired in designing miniaturized magnetic storage and quantum computing devices. Through ab initio and model calculations, we propose that special p-element dimers and single-adatom on symmetry-matched substrates possess giant atomic MAE of 72-200 meV with room temperature structural stability. The huge MAE originates from degenerate orbitals around Fermi level. More importantly, we developed a simplified quantum mechanical model to understand the principle on how to obtain giant MAE for supported magnetic structures.…
The magnetic fields of the Ice Giant Planets Uranus and Neptune (U/N) are unique in the solar system. Based on a substantial database measured on Earth for representative planetary fluids at representative dynamic pressures up to 200 GPa (2 Mbar) and a few 1000 K, the complex magnetic fields of U/N are (i) probably made primarily by degenerate metallic fluid H (MFH) at or near the crossover from the H-He envelopes to Ice cores at ~100 GPa (Mbar) pressures and normalized radii of ~90% of the radii of U/N; (ii) because those magnetic fields are made relatively close to the surfaces of U/N, non-d…
We present a density functional perturbation theory approach to estimate the transition temperature of the charge density wave transition of TiSe2. The softening of the phonon mode at the L-point where in TiSe2 a giant Kohn anomaly occurs, and the energy difference between the normal and distorted phase are analyzed. Both features are studied as function of the electronic temperature, which corresponds to the Fermi-Dirac distribution smearing value in the calculation. The transition temperature is found to be 500 K and 600 K by phonon and energy analysis, respectively, in reasonable agreement …
\textit{Ab initio} random structure searching based on density functional theory is used to determine the ground-state structures of ice at high pressures. Including estimates of lattice zero-point energies, ice is found to adopt three novel crystal phases. The underlying sub-lattice of O atoms remains similar among them, and the transitions can be characterized by reorganizations of the hydrogen bonds. The symmetric hydrogen bonds of ice X and $Pbcm$ are initially lost as ice transforms to structures with symmetries $Pmc2_1$ (800 - 950 GPa) and $P2_1$ (1.17 TPa), but they are eventually regai…
Optimizing ferroelectrics for contemporary high-frequency applications asks for the fundamental understanding of ferroelectric switching and domain wall (DW) motion in ultrafast field pulses while the microscopic understanding of the latter is so far incomplete. To close this gap in knowledge, ab initio-based molecular dynamics simulations are utilized to analyze the dynamics of 180$^\grad# DWs in the prototypical ferroelectric material BaTiO 3 . How ultrafast field application initially excites the dipoles in the system and how they relax to their steady state via transient negative capacitan…
All phonons in a single crystal of NaBr were measured by inelastic neutron scattering at temperatures of 10, 300 and 700 K. Even at 300 K the phonons, especially the longitudinal-optical (LO) phonons, showed large shifts in frequencies, and showed large broadenings in energy owing to anharmonicity. Ab initio computations were first performed with the quasiharmonic approximation (QHA), in which the phonon frequencies depend only on $V$, and on $T$ only insofar as it alters $V$ by thermal expansion. This QHA was an unqualified failure for predicting the temperature dependence of phonon frequenci…
C-H-N-O system is central for organic chemistry and biochemistry, and plays a major role in planetary science (dominating the composition of "ice giants" Uranus and Neptune). The inexhaustible chemical diversity of this system at normal conditions explains it as the basis of all known life, but the chemistry of this system at high pressures and temperatures of planetary interiors is poorly known. Using ab initio evolutionary algorithm USPEX, we performed an extensive study of the phase diagram of the C-H-N-O system at pressures of 50, 200, and 400 GPa and temperatures up to 3000 K. Eight novel…
Water ice is a unique material presenting intriguing physical properties, like negative thermal expansion and anomalous volume isotope effect (VIE). They arise from the interplay between weak hydrogen bonds and nuclear quantum fluctuations, making theoretical calculations challenging. Here, we employ the stochastic self-consistent harmonic approximation (SSCHA) to investigate how thermal and quantum fluctuations affect the physical properties of ice XI ab initio. Regarding the anomalous VIE, our work reveals that quantum effects on hydrogen are so strong to be in a nonlinear regime: when progr…
Nuclear quantum effects lead to an anomalous shift of the volume of hexagonal ice; heavy ice has a larger volume than light ice. This anomaly in ice increases with temperature and persists in liquid water up to the boiling point. We study nuclear quantum effects on the density and compressibility of several ice-like structures and crystalline ice phases. By calculating the anisotropic contributions to the stain tensor, we analyze how the compressibility changes along different directions in hexagonal ice, and find that hexagonal ice is softer along the x-y plane than the z-direction. Furthermo…
The kinetic energy of H and O nuclei has been studied by path integral molecular dynamics simulations of ice Ih and water at ambient pressure. The simulations were performed by using the q-TIP4P/F model, a point charge empirical potential that includes molecular flexibility and anharmonicity in the OH stretch of the water molecule. Ice Ih was studied in a temperature range between 210-290 K, and water between 230-320 K. Simulations of an isolated water molecule were performed in the range 210-320 K to estimate the contribution of the intramolecular vibrational modes to the kinetic energy. Our …
Pressure-induced desalting of NaCl-bearing ice VII: A compositional filter in water-rich planets
École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL)（洛桑联邦理工学院）；Sorbonne Université（索邦大学）；Paul Scherrer Institute (PSI)（保罗谢尔研究所）；Université Paris Cité（巴黎西岱大学）；Nantes Université（南特大学）
The interfacial behaviour of water remains a central question to fields as diverse as protein folding, friction and ice formation[1,2]. While the structural and dynamical properties of water at interfaces differ strongly from those in the bulk, major gaps in our knowledge at the molecular level still prevent us from understanding these ubiquitous chemical processes. Information concerning the microscopic motion of water comes mostly from computational simulation[3,4] but the dynamics of molecules, on the atomic scale, is largely unexplored by experiment. Here we present experimental results co…
