title: Simple liquids' quasiuniversality and the hard-sphere paradigm.
abstract: This topical review discusses the quasiuniversality of simple liquids' structure and dynamics and two possible justifications of it. The traditional one is based on the van der Waals picture of liquids in which the hard-sphere system reflects the basic physics. An alternative explanation argues that all quasiuniversal liquids to a good approximation conform to the same equation of motion, referring to the exponentially repulsive pair-potential system as the basic reference system. The paper, which is aimed at non-experts, ends by listing a number of open problems in the field.
authors.affiliation: "Glass and Time", IMFUFA, Department of Science and Environment, Roskilde University, Postbox 260, DK-4000 Roskilde, Denmark.
authors.forename: Jeppe C
authors.initials: JC
authors.lastname: Dyre