Related papers: Glasses and aging: A Statistical Mechanics Perspec…
Aging dynamics in glassy systems is investigated by considering the hopping motion in a rugged energy landscape whose deep minima are characterized by an exponential density of states. In particular we explore the behavior of a generic…
We present time-dependent dielectric loss data at different frequencies for a variety of glass formers after cooling below the glass temperature. The observed aging dynamics is described using a modified Kohlrausch-Williams-Watts law, which…
The aging dynamics of a simple model glass is numerically investigated observing how it takes place in the potential energy landscape $V$. Partitioning the landscape in basins of minima of $|\nabla V|^2$, we are able to elucidate some…
We review the phenomena of dynamical heterogeneity in glass-forming systems and its description within replica and mean-field theories of the glass transition.
The description of activated relaxation of glassy systems in the multidimensional configurational space is a long-standing open problem. We develop a phenomenological description of the out-of-equilibrium dynamics of a model with a rough…
In the framework of schematic hard spheres lattice models we discuss Edwards' Statistical Mechanics approach to granular media. As this approach appears to hold here to a very good approximation, by analytical calculations of Edwards'…
The glass transition is considered as a phase transition in the system of topologically protected excitations in matter structure. The critical behavior of the system is considered both in statics and dynamics cases. It is shown in the…
Many mean-field models have been introduced to describe the mechanical behavior of glassy materials. They often rely on averages performed over distributions of elements or states. We here underline that averaging is a more intricate…
In this talk I review some recent developments which shed light on the main connections between structural glasses and mean-field spin glass models with a discontinuous transition. I also discuss the role of quantum fluctuations on the…
Understanding glasses is considered to be one of the most fundamental problems in statistical physics. A theoretical approach to unravel their universal properties is to consider the validity of equilibrium concepts such as temperature and…
We present a simple model of a vibrated box of sand, and discuss its dynamics in terms of two parameters reflecting static and dynamic disorder respectively. The fluidised, intermediate and frozen (`glassy') dynamical regimes are…
In these four lectures I describe basic ideas and methods applicable to both classical and quantum systems displaying slow relaxation and non-equilibrium dynamics. The first half of these notes considers classical systems, and the second…
We consider a simple model of a structural glass, represented by a lattice gas with kinetic constraints in contact with a particle reservoir. Quench below the glass transition is represented by the jump of the chemical potential above a…
In this talk I will review some of the recent applications of the replica theory to glasses. I will firstly describe the basic assumptions and I will show that they can be considered as a precise reformulations of old ideas. The relation of…
As one increases the concentration of a colloidal suspension, the system exhibits a dramatic increase in viscosity. Structurally, the system resembles a liquid, yet motions within the suspension are slow enough that it can be considered…
Despite the use of glasses for thousands of years, the nature of the glass transition is still mysterious. On approaching the glass transition, the growth of dynamic heterogeneity has long been thought to play a key role in explaining the…
We investigate universal features of the jamming transition in granular materials, colloids and glasses. We show that the jamming transition in these systems has common features: slowing of response to external perturbation, and the onset…
In this letter we study a lattice gas system that undergoes a glassy transition. When we approach the glass transition we find both a divergence of a point to set correlation length and the vanishing of the thermodynamic potential. These…
In an effort to understand the glass transition, the kinetics of a spin model with frustration but no quenched randomness has been analyzed. The phenomenology of the spin model is remarkably similiar to that of structural glasses. Analysis…
Ergodicity breaking and aging effects are fundamental challenges in out-of-equilibrium systems. Various mechanisms have been proposed to understand the non-ergodic and aging phenomena, possibly related to observations in systems ranging…