An improved Monte Carlo scheme for simulation of synthesis of nanoparticles in reverse micelles

Singh, Reetu and Durairaj, MR and Kumar, Sanjeev (2003) An improved Monte Carlo scheme for simulation of synthesis of nanoparticles in reverse micelles. In: Langmuir, 19 (15). pp. 6317-6328.

PDF An_Improved_Monte.pdf - Published Version Restricted to Registered users only Download (205kB) | Request a copy

Abstract

An improved Monte Carlo technique is presented in this work to simulate nanoparticle formation through a micellar route. The technique builds on the simulation technique proposed by Bandyopadhyaya et al. (Langmuir 2000, 16, 7139) which is general and rigorous but at the same time very computation intensive, so much so that nanoparticle formation in low occupancy systems cannot be simulated in reasonable time. In view of this, several strategies, rationalized by simple mathematical analyses, are proposed to accelerate Monte Carlo simulations. These are elimination of infructuous events, removal of excess reactant postreaction, and use of smaller micelle population a large number of times. Infructuous events include collision of an empty micelle with another empty one or with another one containing only one molecule or only a solid particle. These strategies are incorporated in a new simulation technique which divides the entire micelle population in four classes and shifts micelles from one class to other as the simulation proceeds. The simulation results, throughly tested using chi-square and other tests, show that the predictions of the improved technique remain unchanged, but with more than an order of magnitude decrease in computational effort for some of the simulations reported in the literature. A post priori validation scheme for the correctness of the simulation results has been utilized to propose a new simulation strategy to arrive at converged simulation results with near minimum computational effort.

Item Type:	Journal Article
Publication:	Langmuir
Publisher:	American Chemical Society
Additional Information:	Copyright of this article belongs to American Chemical Society.
Department/Centre:	Division of Mechanical Sciences > Chemical Engineering
Date Deposited:	04 Aug 2011 06:54
Last Modified:	04 Aug 2011 06:54
URI:	http://eprints.iisc.ac.in/id/eprint/39754

Actions (login required)

View Item