Physics – Condensed Matter – Disordered Systems and Neural Networks
Scientific paper
2009-04-09
J. Stat. Mech. (2009) L12002
Physics
Condensed Matter
Disordered Systems and Neural Networks
6 pages, 5 figures
Scientific paper
10.1088/1742-5468/2009/12/L12002
The dramatic slowdown of glass-forming liquids has been variously linked to increasing dynamic and static correlation lengths. Yet, empirical evidence is insufficient to decide among competing theories. The random first order theory (RFOT) links the dynamic slowdown to the growth of amorphous static order, whose range depends on a balance between configurational entropy and surface tension. This last quantity is expected to vanish when the temperature surpasses a spinodal point beyond which there are no metastable states. Here we measure for the first time the surface tension in a model glass-former, and find that it vanishes at the energy separating minima from saddles, demonstrating the existence of a spinodal point for amorphous metastable order. Moreover, the fluctuations of surface tension become smaller for lower temperatures, in quantitative agreement with recent theoretical speculation that spatial correlations in glassy systems relax nonexponentially because of the narrowing of the surface tension distribution.
Cammarota Chiara
Cavagna Andrea
Gradenigo Giacomo
Grigera Tomas S.
Verrocchio Paolo
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