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PHYSICAL SIMULATIONS

Atomic-scale shockwaves go big

Nature Reviews Physics volume 3, page 461 (2021)Cite this article

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Usually, running a simulation involves writing computer code — but not always. ‘Physical simulations’ (or ‘analogue simulations’) are experiments that capture the hard-to-measure physics of one system in some other system that can be readily observed or controlled, such as by using mechanical metamaterials to simulate topological insulators. Now, the tool of physical simulations has been brought to study shockwaves in solids, which can have a dramatic effect on the microscopic structure of a material (pictured). Writing in Physical Review Letters, Jian Li and colleagues report a proof-of-concept table-top experiment that uses magnetic beads on a rod and makes it possible to track atom-by-atom how a shockwave propagates.

An open question about shockwaves in solids is whether continuum models capture all the relevant physics. This question has previously been raised in light of computer simulations of atomic systems, but it may be that those simulation results are affected by artefacts of the molecular dynamics codes used. Because Li et al.’s physical and numerical simulations involved discrete particles, but with relatively simple classical interactions, they were able to approach this problem from a different direction. The numerical model of the magnets revealed that a disordered region is nucleated on the particle scale and grows to fill the system — behaviour that raises questions about the validity of continuum models.

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References

Original article

  • Li, J., Chockalingam, S. & Cohen, T. Observation of ultraslow shock waves in a tunable magnetic lattice. Phys. Rev. Lett. (in the press)

Related articles

  • Li, J., Chockalingam, S. & Cohen, T. Observation of ultra-slow shock waves in a tunable magnetic lattice. Preprint at https://arxiv.org/abs/2101.12320 (2021)

  • Higginbotham, A. et al. Molecular dynamics simulations of shock-induced deformation twinning of a body-centered-cubic metal. Phys. Rev. B 88, 104105 (2013)

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  1. Nature Reviews Physics https://www.nature.com/natrevphys/

    Zoe Budrikis

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  1. Zoe Budrikis
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Correspondence to Zoe Budrikis.

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Budrikis, Z. Atomic-scale shockwaves go big. Nat Rev Phys 3, 461 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1038/s42254-021-00346-x

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