{"title":"Is glass a state of matter?","authors":"Benjamin Guiselin, G. Tarjus, L. Berthier","doi":"10.13036/17533562.63.5.15","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"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 point to avoid crystallisation. The viscosity of this supercooled liquid increases by many orders of magnitude upon cooling, until the liquid becomes essentially arrested on experimental timescales below the ‘glass transition‘ temperature. From a structural viewpoint, the obtained glass still very much resembles the disordered liquid, but from a mechanical viewpoint, it is as rigid as an ordered crystal. Does glass qualify as a separate state of matter? We provide a pedagogical perspective on this question using basic statistical mechanical concepts. We recall the definitions of states of matter and of phase transitions between them. We review recent theoretical results suggesting why and how an ‘ideal glass’ can indeed be defined as a separate equilibrium state of matter. We discuss recent success of computer simulations trying to analyse this glass state. We close with some experimental perspectives.","PeriodicalId":49696,"journal":{"name":"Physics and Chemistry of Glasses-European Journal of Glass Science and Technology Part B","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.3000,"publicationDate":"2022-07-28","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"7","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Physics and Chemistry of Glasses-European Journal of Glass Science and Technology Part B","FirstCategoryId":"88","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.13036/17533562.63.5.15","RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"材料科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q4","JCRName":"CHEMISTRY, PHYSICAL","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 7
Abstract
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 point to avoid crystallisation. The viscosity of this supercooled liquid increases by many orders of magnitude upon cooling, until the liquid becomes essentially arrested on experimental timescales below the ‘glass transition‘ temperature. From a structural viewpoint, the obtained glass still very much resembles the disordered liquid, but from a mechanical viewpoint, it is as rigid as an ordered crystal. Does glass qualify as a separate state of matter? We provide a pedagogical perspective on this question using basic statistical mechanical concepts. We recall the definitions of states of matter and of phase transitions between them. We review recent theoretical results suggesting why and how an ‘ideal glass’ can indeed be defined as a separate equilibrium state of matter. We discuss recent success of computer simulations trying to analyse this glass state. We close with some experimental perspectives.
期刊介绍:
Physics and Chemistry of Glasses accepts papers of a more purely scientific interest concerned with glasses and their structure or properties. Thus the subject of a paper will normally determine the journal in which it will be published.