Overlapping Subcritical Bubbles: Free Energy and Lifetime
Abstract
Subcritical bubbles can form an appreciable population during weak first-order phase transitions, but are usually treated as isolated fluctuations. This raises the question of whether spatial overlap between neighboring subcritical bubbles can modify their evolution. We address this question by combining analytic free-energy calculations for composite Gaussian profiles with Langevin simulations of overlapping configurations. We find that the overlap lowers the free-energy cost and generally increases the lifetime of subcritical bubbles, with the enhanced persistence potentially feeding back on their abundance. Such overlap can therefore generate collective effects and should be incorporated into kinetic descriptions of subcritical-bubble populations.
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BibTeX
@misc{chen2026overlapping,
title = {{Overlapping Subcritical Bubbles: Free Energy and Lifetime}},
author = {Guangshang Chen and Yang Xiao and Jin Min Yang and Yang Zhang},
howpublished = {arXiv},
year = {2026},
month = oct,
doi = {10.48550/arxiv.2610.01629},
eprint = {2610.01629},
archivePrefix = {arXiv},
url = {https://arxiv.org/abs/2610.01629},
}
RIS
TY - UNPB
TI - Overlapping Subcritical Bubbles: Free Energy and Lifetime
AU - Guangshang Chen
AU - Yang Xiao
AU - Jin Min Yang
AU - Yang Zhang
PY - 2026
DA - 2026/10/08
PB - arXiv
DO - 10.48550/arxiv.2610.01629
UR - https://arxiv.org/abs/2610.01629
AB - Subcritical bubbles can form an appreciable population during weak first-order phase transitions, but are usually treated as isolated fluctuations. This raises the question of whether spatial overlap between neighboring subcritical bubbles can modify their evolution. We address this question by combining analytic free-energy calculations for composite Gaussian profiles with Langevin simulations of overlapping configurations. We find that the overlap lowers the free-energy cost and generally increases the lifetime of subcritical bubbles, with the enhanced persistence potentially feeding back on their abundance. Such overlap can therefore generate collective effects and should be incorporated into kinetic descriptions of subcritical-bubble populations.
ER -