A Novel Method to Probe the Pronounced Growth of Correlation Lengths in an Active Glass-forming Liquids using Elongated Probe

TL;DR

This paper introduces a method using elongated probe particles to measure the rapid growth of dynamic and static correlation lengths in active glass-forming liquids, revealing significant differences from passive systems.

Contribution

It demonstrates a novel experimental approach to probe correlation lengths in active glasses and provides a scaling theory explaining observed violations of classical relations.

Findings

Dynamic and static lengths grow faster in active systems.

The method is experimentally viable for studying active glass dynamics.

Scaling theory explains violations of Stokes-Einstein relations.

Abstract

The growth of correlation lengths in equilibrium glass-forming liquids near the glass transition is considered a critical finding in the quest to understand the physics of glass formation. These understandings helped us understand various dynamical phenomena observed in supercooled liquids. It is known that at least two different length scales exist - one is of thermodynamic origin, while the other is dynamical in nature. Recent observations of glassy dynamics in biological and synthetic systems where the external or internal driving source controls the dynamics, apart from the usual thermal noise, led to the emergence of the field of active matter. A question of whether the physics of glass formation in these active systems is also accompanied by growing dynamic and static lengths is indeed timely. In this article, we probe the growth of dynamic and static lengths in a model active glass system using rod-like elongated probe particles, an experimentally viable method. We show that the dynamic and static lengths in these non-equilibrium systems grow much more rapidly than their passive counterparts. We then offer an understanding of the violation of the Stokes-Einstein relation and Stokes-Einstein-Debye relation using these lengths via a scaling theory.