EL-GLASS

The energy Landscapes of metastable states of supercooled liquids

Coordinatore	THE CHANCELLOR, MASTERS AND SCHOLARS OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CAMBRIDGE    more  Organization address address: The Old Schools, Trinity Lane city: CAMBRIDGE postcode: CB2 1TN contact info Titolo: Ms. Nome: Renata Cognome: Schaeffer Email: send email Telefono: +44 1223 333543 Fax: +44 1223 332988
Nazionalità Coordinatore	United Kingdom [UK]
Totale costo	203˙049 €
EC contributo	203˙049 €
Programma	FP7-PEOPLE Specific programme "People" implementing the Seventh Framework Programme of the European Community for research, technological development and demonstration activities (2007 to 2013)
Code Call	FP7-PEOPLE-2010-IEF
Funding Scheme	MC-IEF
Anno di inizio	2011
Periodo (anno-mese-giorno)	2011-08-08   -   2013-08-07

 Partecipanti

#	participant	country	role	EC contrib. [€]
1	THE CHANCELLOR, MASTERS AND SCHOLARS OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CAMBRIDGE  Organization address address: The Old Schools, Trinity Lane city: CAMBRIDGE postcode: CB2 1TN contact info Titolo: Ms. Nome: Renata Cognome: Schaeffer Email: send email Telefono: +44 1223 333543 Fax: +44 1223 332988	UK (CAMBRIDGE)	coordinator	203˙049.60

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 Obiettivo del progetto (Objective)

'Recently it has become generally accepted that a root cause of the divergently slow dynamics of glassy liquids is the tendency of the molecules to become stuck in metastable configurations (states). This effect leads to an increasing separation of time scales between local vibrational motion and larger scale molecular reconfiguration. We will use state-of-the-art geometry optimisation techniques along with large scale molecular dynamics simulations to explore the energy landscape that supports these metastable states, focusing in particular on the escape mechanism from such traps. We will frame our investigation around the use of a reaction coordinate which measures proximity to a given metastable state. The order parameter will be realized in several ways: as the liquid's structural overlap with a metastable molecular configuration, and as the size of a mobile droplet in an environment of immobile molecules taken from a given metastable configuration. We will test whether these reaction coordinates are meaningful order parameters. We will further examine how the static energy landscape and the dynamics are dependent on the reaction coordinate, and how changes in the former are realized in the latter. Our results will be a stringent test for many contemporary theories of the glass transition by scrutinising the concept of a metastable state, by characterising escape mechanisms, and by demonstrating how these paths define the organisation of the underlying energy landscape. Our use of appropriately derived order parameters will greatly reduce the relevant phase space that needs to be considered, and will be combined with cutting edge methodology for constructing equilibrium densities of states and for rare event dynamics to examine the thermodynamic and dynamic properties at low temperatures. This approach should produce definitive and unambiguous results that should greatly strengthen the foundations of our understanding of glassy dynamics.'

Introduzione (Teaser)

Stained glass windows in old churches appear to have thicker solid panes of glass at the bottom than at the top, as if glass flowed slowly. EU-funded physicists are working on the glass puzzle: is it a solid or merely an extremely slow moving liquid?