Linear stability analysis of phase separation in nanoscale systems Original Research Article

A linear stability analysis of the early stages of spinodal decomposition in nanospheres has been performed. The dominant decomposition mode is described in terms of a stability map, which defines regions of the fastest growing composition modulation in a space of particle radius and km, where km is the most unstable mode in the bulk system. It is shown that at sufficiently small particle size the first unstable mode is the non-radially symmetric first-order spherical harmonic. The analysis is extended to the case of nanowires and the interplay between decomposition along the wire length vs. radial and angular perturbations is discussed.