Critical-like behaviour of glass-forming liquids.
Recently it has been revealed that when approaching the glass-transition temperature, T(g), the dynamics of a liquid not only drastically slows down, but also becomes progressively more heterogeneous. From our simulations and experiments of six different glass-forming liquids, we find that the heterogeneous dynamics is a result of critical-like fluctuations of static structural order, contrary to a common belief that it is purely of dynamic origin. The static correlation length and susceptibility of a structural order parameter show Ising-like power-law divergence towards the ideal glass-transition point. However, this structural ordering accompanies little density change, which explains why it has not been detected by the static structure factor so far. Our results suggest a far more direct link than thought before between glass transition and critical phenomena. Indeed, the glass transition may be a new type of critical phenomenon where a structural order parameter is directly linked to slowness.
Tanaka
Hajime
H
Institute of Industrial Science, University of Tokyo, 4-6-1 Komaba, Meguro-ku, Tokyo 153-8505, Japan. tanaka@iis.u-tokyo.ac.jp
Kawasaki
Takeshi
T
Shintani
Hiroshi
H
Watanabe
Keiji
K