title: Fragility and basic process energies in vitrifying systems.
abstract: The concept of 'fragility' constitutes a central point of the glass transition science serving as the 'universal' metric linking previtreous dynamics of qualitatively distinct systems. Finding the fundamental meaning of fragility is the 'condicio sine qua' for reaching the long expected conceptual breakthrough in this domain. This report shows that fragility is determined by the ratio between two fundamental process energies, viz. the activation enthalpy and activation energy. The reasoning, avoiding any underlying physical model, is supported by the experimental evidence ranging from low molecular weight liquids and polymers to plastic crystals and liquid crystals. All these lead to the new general scaling plot for dynamics of arbitrary glass former. The limited adequacy of broadly used so far semi-empirical relationships between fragility and the activation energy is shown. Results presented remain valid for an arbitrary complex system and collective phenomena if their dynamics is described by the general super-Arrhenius relation.
authors: Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, University of Berne, Freiestrasse 3, Berne CH-3012, Switzerland.
authors: Julio Cesar
authors: JC
authors: Martinez-Garcia
authors: 1] Institute of High Pressure Physics Polish Academy of Sciences, ul. Sokołowska 27/39, 01-142 Warsaw, Poland [2] Institute of Physics &ŚMCEBI, University of Silesia, ul. 75 Pułku Piechoty 1A, 41-500 Chorzów, Poland.
authors: Sylwester J
authors: SJ
authors: Rzoska
authors: Institute of High Pressure Physics Polish Academy of Sciences, ul. Sokołowska 27/39, 01-142 Warsaw, Poland.
authors: Aleksandra
authors: A
authors: Drozd-Rzoska
authors: Institute of Physics &ŚMCEBI, University of Silesia, ul. 75 Pułku Piechoty 1A, 41-500 Chorzów, Poland.
authors: Szymon
authors: S
authors: Starzonek
authors: Science and Technology Division, Corning Incorporated, Corning, New York 14831, USA.
authors: John C
authors: JC
authors: Mauro