Dynamically correlated regions and configurational entropy in supercooled liquids

dc.creatorCapaccioli, Simone
dc.creatorRuocco, Giancarlo
dc.creatorZamponi, Francesco
dc.date2007-10-05
dc.date.accessioned2026-07-07T09:57:44Z
dc.date.available2026-07-07T09:57:44Z
dc.descriptionWhen a liquid is cooled below its melting temperature, if crystallization is avoided, it forms a glass. This phenomenon, called glass transition, is characterized by a marked increase of viscosity, about 14 orders of magnitude, in a narrow temperature interval. The microscopic mechanism behind the glass transition is still poorly understood. However, recently, great advances have been made in the identification of cooperative rearranging regions, or dynamical heterogeneities, i.e. domains of the liquid whose relaxation is highly correlated. The growth of the size of these domains is now believed to be the driving mechanism for the increase of the viscosity. Recently a tool to quantify the size of these domains has been proposed. We apply this tool to a wide class of materials to investigate the correlation between the size of the heterogeneities and their configurational entropy, i.e. the number of states accessible to a correlated domain. We find that the relaxation time of a given system, apart from a material dependent pre-factor, is a universal function of the configurational entropy of a correlated domain. As a consequence, we find that at the glass transition temperature, the size of the domains and the configurational entropy per unit volume are anti-correlated, as originally predicted by the Adam-Gibbs theory. Finally, we use our data to extract some exponents defined in the framework of the Random First Order Theory, a recent quantitative theory of the glass transition.
dc.description8 pages, 4 figures, 3 tables
dc.identifierhttps://arxiv.org/abs/0710.1249
dc.identifierhttp://arxiv.org/abs/0710.1249
dc.identifierJ.Phys.Chem.B 112, 10652 (2008)
dc.identifier.urihttp://salesiana.dossiersoluciones.com/handle/123456789/167454
dc.subjectDisordered Systems and Neural Networks
dc.subjectSoft Condensed Matter
dc.subjectStatistical Mechanics
dc.titleDynamically correlated regions and configurational entropy in supercooled liquids
dc.typetext

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