Evaporating laminar microjets for studies of rapidly evolving structural transformations in supercooled liquids

Abstract

The investigation of non-equilibrium phase transformations, such as crystallization, in supercooled liquids – below their melting point but still liquid – is of fundamental importance in condensed matter physics. However, accessing experimentally the details of such fast structural changes proves challenging. Here, we show that microscopic laminar jets in vacuum offer a powerful tool for novel studies of supercooled liquids on previously inaccessible time scales in a class of atomic and molecular model systems that have so far remained inaccessible because of the lack of adequate experimental approaches. The use of liquid jets represents a remarkable opportunity to significantly advance our knowledge of topics that are relevant to interdisciplinary fields such as atmospheric physics and material science.