Thermodynamics of the insulator-metal transition in dense liquid deuterium
Abstract
Recent dynamic compression experiments [M. D. Knudson et al., Science 348, 1455 (2015), 10.1126/science.aaa7471; P. M. Celliers et al., Science 361, 677 (2018), 10.1126/science.aat0970] have observed the insulator-metal transition in dense liquid deuterium, but with an approximately 95-GPa difference in the quoted pressures for the transition at comparable estimated temperatures. It was claimed in the latter of these two papers that a very large latent heat effect on the temperature was overlooked in the first, requiring correction of those temperatures downward by a factor of 2, thereby putting both experiments on the same theoretical phase boundary and reconciling the pressure discrepancy. We have performed extensive path-integral molecular dynamics calculations with density functional theory to directly calculate the isentropic temperature drop due to latent heat in the insulator-metal transition for dense liquid deuterium and show that this large temperature drop is not consistent with the underlying thermodynamics.
- Publication:
-
Physical Review B
- Pub Date:
- March 2020
- DOI:
- 10.1103/PhysRevB.101.104101
- Bibcode:
- 2020PhRvB.101j4101D