Freezing transition of a strongly dipolar simple fluid

The freezing transition of a strongly dipolar Lennard-Jones fluid is investigated using Monte Carlo simulation. It is found that the system undergoes a ferroelectric liquid-to-solid transition when cooled under a constant pressure. Near the triple point the stable solid phase is a body-centered orthorhombic ferroelectric crystal; a metastable ferroelectric solid phase with distorted hexagonal lattice structure is also discovered. To locate the freezing point, Gibbs free energies of the solid and liquid phase are determined using a thermodynamic integration method. © 2000 The American Physical Society.