title: Probing equilibrium glass flow up to exapoise viscosities.
abstract: Glasses are out-of-equilibrium systems aging under the crystallization threat. During ordinary glass formation, the atomic diffusion slows down, rendering its experimental investigation impractically long, to the extent that a timescale divergence is taken for granted by many. We circumvent these limitations here, taking advantage of a wide family of glasses rapidly obtained by physical vapor deposition directly into the solid state, endowed with different "ages" rivaling those reached by standard cooling and waiting for millennia. Isothermally probing the mechanical response of each of these glasses, we infer a correspondence with viscosity along the equilibrium line, up to exapoise values. We find a dependence of the elastic modulus on the glass age, which, traced back to the temperature steepness index of the viscosity, tears down one of the cornerstones of several glass transition theories: the dynamical divergence. Critically, our results suggest that the conventional wisdom picture of a glass ceasing to flow at finite temperature could be wrong.
authors: Dipartimento di Fisica, Universitá di Roma "La Sapienza," I-00185, Rome, Italy;
authors: Eva Arianna Aurelia
authors: EA
authors: Pogna
authors: Nanomaterials and Microsystems Group, Physics Department, Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, ES-08193, Bellaterra, Spain;
authors: Cristian
authors: C
authors: Rodríguez-Tinoco
authors: Istituto di Fotonica e Nanotecnologie-CNR, Dipartimento di Fisica, Politecnico di Milano, I-20133, Milan, Italy; and.
authors: Giulio
authors: G
authors: Cerullo
authors: Dipartimento di Fisica, Universitá di Roma "La Sapienza," I-00185, Rome, Italy;
authors: Carino
authors: C
authors: Ferrante
authors: Nanomaterials and Microsystems Group, Physics Department, Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, ES-08193, Bellaterra, Spain; MATGAS 2000 AIE, Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, E-08193, Bellaterra, Spain.
authors: Javier
authors: J
authors: Rodríguez-Viejo
authors: Dipartimento di Fisica, Universitá di Roma "La Sapienza," I-00185, Rome, Italy; tullio.scopigno@phys.uniroma1.it.
authors: Tullio
authors: T
authors: Scopigno
keywords: aging; glass transition; inelastic scattering; supercooled liquid; vibrational properties