title: Multiple reentrant glass transitions in confined hard-sphere glasses.
abstract: Glass-forming liquids exhibit a rich phenomenology upon confinement. This is often related to the effects arising from wall-fluid interactions. Here we focus on the interesting limit where the separation of the confining walls becomes of the order of a few particle diameters. For a moderately polydisperse, densely packed hard-sphere fluid confined between two smooth hard walls, we show via event-driven molecular dynamics simulations the emergence of a multiple reentrant glass transition scenario upon a variation of the wall separation. Using thermodynamic relations, this reentrant phenomenon is shown to persist also under constant chemical potential. This allows straightforward experimental investigation and opens the way to a variety of applications in micro- and nanotechnology, where channel dimensions are comparable to the size of the contained particles. The results are in line with theoretical predictions obtained by a combination of density functional theory and the mode-coupling theory of the glass transition.
authors.affiliation: 1] Interdisciplinary Centre for Advanced Materials Simulation (ICAMS), Ruhr-Universität Bochum, Universitätsstraße 150, D-44780 Bochum, Germany [2] Max-Planck-Institut für Eisenforschung, Max-Planck-Straße 1, D-40237, Düsseldorf, Germany.
authors.forename: Suvendu
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Mandal
authors.affiliation: 1] Institut für Theoretische Physik, Leopold-Franzens-Universität Innsbruck, Technikerstraße 25/2, A-6020 Innsbruck, Austria [2] Institut für Theoretische Physik, Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg, Staudtstraße 7, D-91058 Erlangen, Germany.
authors.forename: Simon
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Lang
authors.affiliation: Interdisciplinary Centre for Advanced Materials Simulation (ICAMS), Ruhr-Universität Bochum, Universitätsstraße 150, D-44780 Bochum, Germany.
authors.forename: Markus
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Gross
authors.affiliation: Institut für Angewandte Physik, Eberhard Karls-Universität Tübingen, Auf der Morgenstelle 10, D-72076 Tübingen, Germany.
authors.forename: Martin
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Oettel
authors.affiliation: Max-Planck-Institut für Eisenforschung, Max-Planck-Straße 1, D-40237, Düsseldorf, Germany.
authors.forename: Dierk
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Raabe
authors.affiliation: 1] Institut für Theoretische Physik, Leopold-Franzens-Universität Innsbruck, Technikerstraße 25/2, A-6020 Innsbruck, Austria [2] Institut für Theoretische Physik, Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg, Staudtstraße 7, D-91058 Erlangen, Germany.
authors.forename: Thomas
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Franosch
authors.affiliation: 1] Interdisciplinary Centre for Advanced Materials Simulation (ICAMS), Ruhr-Universität Bochum, Universitätsstraße 150, D-44780 Bochum, Germany [2] Max-Planck-Institut für Eisenforschung, Max-Planck-Straße 1, D-40237, Düsseldorf, Germany.
authors.forename: Fathollah
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Varnik