Segregation disrupts the Arrhenius behavior of an isomerization reaction.

Abstract

Coexistence of segregation and interconversion or isomerization reaction among molecular species leads to fascinating structure formation in the biological and chemical worlds. Using Monte Carlo simulations of the prototype Ising model, we explore the chemical kinetics of such a system consisting of a binary mixture of isomers. Our results reveal that even though the two concerned processes are individually Arrhenius in nature, the Arrhenius behavior of the isomerization reaction gets significantly disrupted due to an interplay of the nonconserved dynamics of the reaction and the conserved diffusive dynamics of segregation. The approach used here can be potentially adapted to understand reaction kinetics of more complex reactions.