Glassy dynamics in asymmetric binary mixtures of hard spheres
Abstract
We perform a systematic and detailed study of the glass transition in highly asymmetric binary mixtures of colloidal hard spheres, combining differential dynamic microscopy experiments, event-driven molecular dynamics simulations, and theoretical calculations, exploring the whole state diagram and determining the self-dynamics and collective dynamics of both species. Two distinct glassy states involving different dynamical arrest transitions are consistently described, namely, a double glass with the simultaneous arrest of the self-dynamics and collective dynamics of both species, and a single glass of large particles in which the self-dynamics of the small species remains ergodic. In the single-glass scenario, spatial modulations in the collective dynamics of both species occur due to the structure of the large spheres, a feature not observed in the double-glass domain. The theoretical results, obtained within the self-consistent generalized Langevin equation formalism, are in agreement with both simulations and experimental data, thus providing a stringent validation of this theoretical framework in the description of dynamical arrest in highly asymmetric mixtures. Our findings are summarized in a state diagram that classifies the various amorphous states of highly asymmetric mixtures by their dynamical arrest mechanisms.
- Publication:
-
Physical Review E
- Pub Date:
- April 2019
- DOI:
- 10.1103/PhysRevE.99.042603
- arXiv:
- arXiv:1807.09628
- Bibcode:
- 2019PhRvE..99d2603L
- Keywords:
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- Condensed Matter - Soft Condensed Matter
- E-Print:
- Phys. Rev. E 99, 042603 (2019)