Irreversible growth of a binary mixture confined in a thin film geometry with competing walls

Abstract

The irreversible growth of a binary mixture under far-from-equilibrium conditions is studied in three-dimensional confined geometries of size $L_x \times L_y \times L_z$, where $L_z \gg L_x = L_y$ is the growing direction. A competing situation where two opposite surfaces prefer different species of the mixture is analyzed. Due to this antisymmetric condition an interface between the different species develops along the growing direction. Such interface undergoes a localization-delocalization transition that is the precursor of a wetting transition in the thermodynamic limit. Furthermore, the growing interface also undergoes a concave-convex transition in the growth mode. So, the system exhibits a multicritical wetting point where the growing interface is almost flat and the interface between species is essentially localized at the center of the film.