Slicing the three-dimensional Ising model : critical equilibrium and coarsening dynamics

Abstract

We study the evolution of spin clusters on two-dimensional slices of the three-dimensional Ising model in contact with a heat bath after a sudden quench to a subcritical temperature. We analyze the evolution of some simple initial configurations, such as a sphere and a torus, of one phase embedded into the other, to confirm that their area disappears linearly with time and to establish the temperature dependence of the prefactor in each case. Two generic kinds of initial states are later used: equilibrium configurations either at infinite temperature or at the paramagnetic-ferromagnetic phase transition. We investigate the morphological domain structure of the coarsening configurations on two-dimensional slices of the three-dimensional system, compared with the behavior of the bidimensional model.