Communications on Applied Mathematics and Computation ›› 2024, Vol. 6 ›› Issue (1): 64-89.doi: 10.1007/s42967-022-00221-1

• ORIGINAL PAPERS • Previous Articles     Next Articles

Bifurcation Analysis Reveals Solution Structures of Phase Field Models

Xinyue Evelyn Zhao1, Long-Qing Chen2, Wenrui Hao3, Yanxiang Zhao4   

  1. 1. Department of Mathematics, Vanderbilt University, Nashville, TN, 37212, USA;
    2. Department of Materials Science and Engineering, Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA, 16802, USA;
    3. Department of Mathematics, Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA, 16802, USA;
    4. Department of Mathematics, The George Washington University, Washington, DC, 20052, USA
  • Received:2022-05-21 Revised:2022-09-12 Published:2024-04-16
  • Contact: Wenrui Hao,E-mail:wxh64@psu.edu;Xinyue Evelyn Zhao,E-mail:xinyue.zhao@vanderbilt.edu;Long-Qing Chen,E-mail:lqc3@psu.edu;Yanxiang Zhao,E-mail:yxzhao@gwu.edu E-mail:wxh64@psu.edu;xinyue.zhao@vanderbilt.edu;lqc3@psu.edu;yxzhao@gwu.edu
  • Supported by:
    The work is primarily supported as part of the Computational Materials Sciences Program funded by the U.S. Department of Energy, Office of Science, Basic Energy Sciences, under Award No. DE-SC0020145. Y.Z. would like to acknowledge support for his effort by the Simons Foundation through Grant No. 357963 and NSF grant DMS-2142500.

Abstract: The phase field method is playing an increasingly important role in understanding and predicting morphological evolution in materials and biological systems. Here, we develop a new analytical approach based on the bifurcation analysis to explore the mathematical solution structure of phase field models. Revealing such solution structures not only is of great mathematical interest but also may provide guidance to experimentally or computationally uncover new morphological evolution phenomena in materials undergoing electronic and structural phase transitions. To elucidate the idea, we apply this analytical approach to three representative phase field equations: the Allen-Cahn equation, the Cahn-Hilliard equation, and the Allen-Cahn-Ohta-Kawasaki system. The solution structures of these three phase field equations are also verified numerically by the homotopy continuation method.

Key words: Phase field modeling, Bifurcations, Multiple solutions