Aging and Energy Landscapes: Application to Liquids and Glasses

TL;DR

This paper extends the potential energy landscape formalism to describe aging in liquids and glasses, providing a theoretical framework that aligns well with molecular dynamics simulation data for various out-of-equilibrium processes.

Contribution

It introduces a generalized equation of state for aging systems based on the energy landscape approach, bridging equilibrium and out-of-equilibrium conditions.

Findings

Theoretical predictions match molecular dynamics data for aging under temperature jumps.

The model successfully describes out-of-equilibrium pressure and temperature effects.

A new framework links energy landscape exploration to aging dynamics.

Abstract

The equation of state for a liquid in equilibrium, written in the potential energy landscape formalism, is generalized to describe out-of-equilibrium conditions. The hypothesis that during aging the system explores basins associated to equilibrium configurations is the key ingredient in the derivation. Theoretical predictions are successfully compared with data from molecular dynamics simulations of different aging processes, such as temperature and pressure jumps.