Non-equilibrium relaxation and aging in the dynamics of a dipolar fluid quenched towards the glass transition

Non-equilibrium view of the amorphous solidification of liquids with competing interactions

The interplay between short-range attractions and long-range repulsions (SALR) characterizes the so-called liquids with competing interactions, which are known to exhibit a variety of equilibrium and non-equilibrium phases. The theoretical description of the phenomenology associated with glassy or gel states in these systems has to take into account both the presence of thermodynamic instabilities (such as those defining the spinodal line and the so called λ line) and the limited capability to describe genuine non-equilibrium processes from first principles. Here, we report the first application of the non-equilibrium self-consistent generalized Langevin equation theory to the description of the dynamical arrest processes that occur in SALR systems after being instantaneously quenched into a state point in the regions of thermodynamic instability. The physical scenario predicted by this theory reveals an amazing interplay between the thermodynamically driven instabilities, favoring equilibrium macro- and micro-phase separation, and the kinetic arrest mechanisms, favoring non-equilibrium amorphous solidification of the liquid into an unexpected variety of glass and gel states.

Phase separation and dynamical arrest of protein solutions dominated by short-range attractions

The interplay of liquid-liquid phase separation (LLPS) and dynamical arrest can lead to the formation of gels and glasses, which is relevant for such diverse fields as condensed matter physics, materials science, food engineering, and the pharmaceutical industry. In this context, protein solutions exhibit remarkable equilibrium and non-equilibrium behaviors. In the regime where attractive and repulsive forces compete, it has been demonstrated, for example, that the location of the dynamical arrest line seems to be independent of ionic strength, so that the arrest lines at different ionic screening lengths overlap, in contrast to the LLPS coexistence curves, which strongly depend on the salt concentration. In this work, we show that the same phenomenology can also be observed when the electrostatic repulsions are largely screened, and the range and strength of the attractions are varied. In particular, using lysozyme in brine as a model system, the metastable gas-liquid binodal and the dynamical arrest line as well as the second virial coefficient have been determined for various solution conditions by cloud-point measurements, optical microscopy, centrifugation experiments, and light scattering. With the aim of understanding this new experimental phenomenology, we apply the non-equilibrium self-consistent generalized Langevin equation theory to a simple model system with only excluded volume plus short-range attractions, to study the dependence of the predicted arrest lines on the range of the attractive interaction. The theoretical predictions find a good qualitative agreement with experiments when the range of the attraction is not too small compared with the size of the protein.

Structural relaxation, dynamical arrest, and aging in soft-sphere liquids

We investigate the structural relaxation of a soft-sphere liquid quenched isochorically (ϕ = 0.7) and instantaneously to different temperatures T_f above and below the glass transition. For this, we combine extensive Brownian dynamics simulations and theoretical calculations based on the non-equilibrium self-consistent generalized Langevin equation (NE-SCGLE) theory. The response of the liquid to a quench generally consists of a sub-linear increase of the α-relaxation time with system's age. Approaching the ideal glass-transition temperature from above (T_f > T^a), sub-aging appears as a transient process describing a broad equilibration crossover for quenches to nearly arrested states. This allows us to empirically determine an equilibration timescale t^eq(T_f) that becomes increasingly longer as T_f approaches T^a. For quenches inside the glass (T_f ≤ T^a), the growth rate of the structural relaxation time becomes progressively larger as T_f decreases and, unlike the equilibration scenario, τ_α remains evolving within the whole observation time-window. These features are consistently found in theory and simulations with remarkable semi-quantitative agreement and coincide with those revealed in a previous and complementary study [P. Mendoza-Méndez et al., Phys. Rev. 96, 022608 (2017)] that considered a sequence of quenches with fixed final temperature T_f = 0 but increasing ϕ toward the hard-sphere dynamical arrest volume fraction ϕ_HS ^a=0.582. The NE-SCGLE analysis, however, unveils various fundamental aspects of the glass transition, involving the abrupt passage from the ordinary equilibration scenario to the persistent aging effects that are characteristic of glass-forming liquids. The theory also explains that, within the time window of any experimental observation, this can only be observed as a continuous crossover.

From Subaging to Hyperaging in Structural Glasses

We demonstrate nonequilibrium scaling laws for the aging and equilibration dynamics in glass formers that emerge from combining a relaxation equation for the static structure with the equilibrium scaling laws of glassy dynamics. Different scaling regimes are predicted for the evolution of the structural relaxation time τ with age (waiting time t_{w}), depending on the depth of the quench from the liquid into the glass: "simple" aging (τ∼t_{w}) applies for quenches close to the critical point of mode-coupling theory (MCT) and implies "subaging" (τ≈t_{w}^{δ} with δ<1) as a broad equilibration crossover for quenches to nearly arrested equilibrium states; "hyperaging" (or superaging, τ∼t_{w}^{δ^{'}} with δ^{'}>1) emerges for quenches deep into the glass. The latter is cut off by non-mean-field fluctuations that we account for within a recent extension of MCT, the stochastic β-relaxation theory (SBR). We exemplify the scaling laws with a schematic model that quantitatively fits simulation data.

"Inner clocks" of glass-forming liquids

Providing a physically sound explanation of aging phenomena in non-equilibrium amorphous materialsis a challenging problem in modern statistical thermodynamics. The slow evolution of physical propertiesafter quenches of control parameters is empirically well interpreted via the concept of material time (orinternal clock), based on the Tool-Narayanaswamy-Moynihan (TNM) model. Yet, the fundamental reasonsof its striking success remain unclear. We propose a microscopic rationale behind the material time onthe basis of the linear laws of irreversible thermodynamics and its extension that treats the correspondingkinetic coefficients as state functions of a slowly evolving material state. Our interpretation is based onthe recognition that the same mathematical structure governs both the Tool model and the recently devel-oped non-equilibrium extension of the self-consistent generalized Langevin equation theory (NE-SCGLE),guided by the universal principles of Onsager's theory of irreversible processes. This identification opensthe way for a generalization of the material-time concept to aging systems where several relaxation modeswith very different equilibration processes must be considered, and partially frozen glasses manifest theappearance of partial ergodicity breaking, and hence materials with multiple very distinct inner clocks.