Related papers: Tailoring the flow of soft glasses by soft additiv…
The glass transition in binary mixtures of star polymers is studied by mode coupling theory and extensive molecular dynamics computer simulations. In particular, we have explored vitrification in the parameter space of size asymmetry…
We use theory and simulations to investigate the existence of amorphous glassy states in ultrasoft colloids. We combine the hyper-netted chain approximation with mode-coupling theory to study the dynamic phase diagram of soft repulsive…
Crystallization and vitrification are two different routes to form a solid. Normally these two processes suppress each other, with the glass transition preventing crystallization at high density (or low temperature). This is even true for…
Solids deform and fluids flow, but soft glassy materials, such as emulsions, foams, suspensions, and pastes, exhibit an intricate mix of solid and liquid-like behavior. While much progress has been made to understand their elastic (small…
The vibrational dynamics of a model polymer glass is studied by Molecular Dynamics simulations. The focus is on the "soft" monomers with high participation to the lower-frequency vibrational modes contributing to the thermodynamic anomalies…
Multiple distinct glass states occur in binary hard-sphere mixtures with constituents of very disparate sizes according to the mode-coupling theory of the glass transition (MCT), distinguished by considering whether small particles remain…
A sheet of glassy polymers placed in a solvent shows swelling behaviors quite different from that of soft polymers (rubbers and gels). (1) Non-Fickian diffusion (called case II diffusion): As solvent permeates into the sample, a sharp front…
Creating amorphous solid states by randomly bonding an ensemble of dense liquid monomers is a common procedure which is applied to create a variety of materials such as epoxy resins, colloidal gels, and vitrimers. The properties of the…
Via large-scale molecular dynamics simulations, we observe the melting of a topological glass of stiff ring polymers by incorporating flexible ring polymers, along an isobaric path. As more flexible ring polymers are introduced, cluster…
We employ effective interaction potentials to study the equilibrium structure and phase behavior of highly asymmetric mixtures of star polymers. We consider in particular the influence of the addition of a component with a small number of…
We develop a new analytic approach for the study of lattice heteropolymers, and apply it to copolymers with correlated Markovian sequences. According to our analysis, heteropolymers present three different dense phases depending upon the…
Hybrid glasses connect emerging fields of metal-organic frameworks (MOFs) with the glass-formation, amorphization, and melting processes of these structurally diverse and chemically versatile systems. Most zeolites, including MOFs,…
Controlling a state of material between its crystalline and glassy phase has fostered many real-world applications. Nevertheless, design rules for crystallization and vitrification kinetics still lack predictive power. Here, we identify…
We discuss the microscopic mechanisms by which low-temperature amorphous states, such as ultrastable glasses, transform into equilibrium fluids, after a sudden temperature increase. Experiments suggest that this process is similar to the…
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…
A monatomic simple liquid in two dimensions, where atoms interact isotropically through the Lennard-Jones-Gauss potential [M. Engel and H.-R. Trebin, Phys. Rev. Lett. 98, 225505 (2007)], is vitrified by the use of a rapid cooling technique…
We analyze low-frequency vibrational modes in a two-dimensional, zero-temperature, quasistatically sheared model glass to identify a population of structural "soft spots" where particle rearrangements are initiated. The population of spots…
We report a detailed experimental study of the structure and dynamics of glassy states in hard spheres with short-range attraction. The system is a suspension of nearly-hard-sphere colloidal particles and non-adsorbing linear polymer which…
We describe a method to determine whether a material has isomorphs in its thermodynamic phase diagram. Isomorphs are state points for which various properties are invariant in reduced units. Such materials are commonly identified from…
The yield stress is a defining feature of amorphous materials which is difficult to analyze theoretically, because it stems from the strongly non-linear response of an arrested solid to an applied deformation. Mode-coupling theory predicts…