Patent ID: 8364316

Claim:
A method, comprising: a processor evaluating a tangent hyperplane distance function D (α) to Identify any points of intersection of a hyperplane tangent to a Gibbs energy function of a first material mature having a composition z comprised of n components having a mole fraction {z 1 , z 2 , . . . , z n } substantially in a first phase with a Gibbs energy function of a second material mixture, where D (α) is defined on a composition domain having k dimensions, where 1≦k<n, wherein the processor is in communication with a memory, the memory storing a thermodynamic modeling application, and wherein Identifying the any points of Intersection is based on the processor executing the thermodynamic modeling application; the processor determining the probability of phase splitting of mixtures of materials at a given temperature, pressure, and composition by characterizing the functuons that describe the system via pseudo-properties; and the processor evaluating a phase stability of the material mixture, where the material mixture is determined to be susceptible to a phase split when the hyperplane tangent to the Gibbs energy function of the first material mixture in the first phase intersects the Gibbs energy function of the second material mixture.