Continuous demixing at liquid-vapor coexistence in a symmetrical binary fluid mixture

Abstract

We report a Monte Carlo finite-size scaling study of the demixing transition of a symmetrical Lennard-Jones binary fluid mixture. For equal concentration of species, and for a choice of the unlike-to-like interaction ratio delta=0.7, this transition is found to be continuous at liquid-vapor coexistence. The associated critical end point exhibits Ising-like universality. These findings confirm those of earlier smaller scale simulation studies of the same model, but contradict the findings of recent integral equation and hierarchical reference theory investigations.