Related papers: Is Cement a Glassy Material?
Calcium silicate hydrates (C-S-H), the main components of hydrated cement, are known for being responsible of its cohesion. In this respect, they act as "glue" for the other solid components of mortar or concrete and thus strongly influence…
CO$_2$ emissions originating from the construction industry have a significant impact on global warming where the production of ordinary Portland cement clinker is responsible for approximately 8\% of all human-made CO$_2$. Alkali doped…
Cement is the most widely used manufacturing material in the world and improving its toughness would allow for the design of slender infrastructure, requiring less material. To this end, we investigate by means of molecular dynamics…
The early stiffening of fresh cement paste plays a key role in shaping and stability during casting and 3D printing. In Portland cement systems, this phenomenon arises from the formation of calcium-silicate-hydrate (C-S-H), which stiffens…
The relationship between humidity and water content in a hydrating cement paste is largely controlled by the nanostructure of the C-S-H gel. Current hydration models do not describe this nanostructure, thus sorption isotherms and…
A wide range of materials can exist in microscopically disordered solid forms, referred to as amorphous solids or glasses. Such materials -- oxide glasses and metallic glasses, to polymer glasses, and soft solids such as colloidal glasses,…
From soft polymeric gels to hardened cement paste, amorphous solids under constant load exhibit a pronounced time-dependent deformation called creep. The microscopic mechanism of such a phenomenon is poorly understood in amorphous materials…
Alkali-activated materials and related alternative cementitious systems are sustainable material technologies that have the potential to substantially lower CO$_2$ emissions associated with the construction industry. However, the impact of…
Glass is everywhere. We use and are surrounded by glass objects which make tangible the reality of glass as a distinct state of matter. Yet, glass as we know it is usually obtained by cooling a liquid sufficiently rapidly below its melting…
Arguably the most ubiquitous construction material in modern civilization, concrete is enabling the development of megacities around the globe together with increasing living standards in developing nations. However, it can be argued that…
Using molecular dynamics simulations, with a realistic many-body embedded-atom potential, and a novel method to characterize local order, we study the structure of pure nickel during the rapid quench of the liquid and in the resulting…
Cement is one of the most produced materials in the world. A major player in greenhouse gas emissions, it is the main binding agent in concrete, to which it provides a cohesive strength that rapidly increases during setting. Understanding…
Amorphous and glassy materials are important for many advanced applications, from flexible solar cells to drug delivery systems. To this end, new glasses are in high demand, but precise chemical design of amorphous materials remains…
Cement hydration products were studied as influenced by the hydration conditions (hydration time in liquid phase; relative humidity, RH, in gaseous phase). The formation of calcium hydroxide (portlandite, P) and its transformation to…
Polymorphism is ubiquitous in crystalline solids. Amorphous solids, such as glassy water and silicon, may undergo amorphous-to-amorphous transitions (AATs). The nature of AATs remains ambiguous, due to diverse system-dependent behaviors and…
We discuss the behavior of a crystalline surface with a disordered substrate. We focus on the possible existence of a {\em super-rough} glassy phase, with height-height correlation functions which vary as the square logarithm of the…
Crystals and quasicrystals can be characterized by an order that is a purely geometric property of an instantaneous configuration, independent of particle dynamics or interactions. Glasses, on the other hand, are ostensibly amorphous…
We study theoretically the equilibrium structure, as well as the response under external load, of characteristic carbon-based materials. The materials considered include diamond, amorphous carbon (a-C), ``amorphous diamond'' and…
Crystalline calcium-aluminates include the phases essential in the setting of Portland cements developed over the last century. It is only within recent decades, however, that calcium-aluminate melts and glasses have begun to attract…
Amorphous solids, or glasses, are distinguished from crystalline solids by their lack of long-range structural order. At the level of two-body structural correlations, glassformers show no qualitative change upon vitrifying from a…