A thermodynamically consistent Ginzburg-Landau model for superfluid transition in liquid helium (Q2393638)

This paper proposes a phenomenological model to describe the phase transition in liquid helium. The paper generalizes the Fabrizio model of the phase transition between helium I and helium II in the framework of the Ginzburg-Landau (GL) theory by considering this passage as a second-order phase transition and introducing a scalar variable \(\varphi\) as order parameter such that the square of \(\varphi\) represents the concentration of the superfluid phase. In the Fabrizio model, the velocity of the fluid is due to a normal and superfluid excitation. By this, the superfluid component satisfies an evolution equation similar to the differential equation governing the motion of the superconducting electrons inside a superconductor. The generalized model of the authors takes variations of the mass density of the fluid and temperature variations into account, additionally assuming that the normal component is a compressible fluid. The pressure becomes a new variable of the problem and the divergence of the normal velocity satisfies a constitutive equation depending on the phase variable \(\varphi\). The differential equation governing the evolution of \(\varphi\) is interpreted as a balance law on the internal order structure. First, an interpretation of the GL equation as a balance law is present. By expressing the order structure balance equality through two potentials, characterizing the order and the feature of the transition, the evolution equation for the order parameter is obtained. Then, the evolution equation for the velocity is stated pointing the analogy between superfluidity and superconductivity. When the fluid is in the normal state, the evolution equation for normal velocity reduces to the Navier-Stokes equation. By considering the phase diagram, the line separating the normal phase from the superfluid is recovered. In order to obtain the kinetic equation for the temperature, the first law of thermodynamics is considered. The authors prove that the model is consistent with thermodynamic principles deducing the differential equation for the temperature from the energy balance law and proving that the Clausius-Duhem inequality is satisfied. It is assumed that the heat flux is the sum of two contributions (i) the term proportional to the gradient temperature (Fourier law), and (ii) the term caused by the superfluid transition involving superfluid velocity and the phase variable \(\varphi\). Finally, the authors show that the differential equation system governing the fluid evolution can be written via a different set of variables, similar to the unknown fields used in superconductivity.