Aging, Fragility and Reversibility Window in Bulk Alloy Glasses

TL;DR

This study investigates the thermal and aging properties of bulk alloy glasses, revealing a specific composition range where glasses become thermally reversible and do not age, indicating a self-organized structural state similar to proteins.

Contribution

It identifies a compositional window in bulk alloy glasses where thermal reversibility and resistance to aging occur, linking structural self-organization to glass stability.

Findings

Reversibility window exists between x=0.09 and 0.145 in the ternary system.

Glasses within this window do not exhibit aging.

Outside the window, glasses show aging and fragility.

Abstract

Non-reversing relaxation enthalpies (DHnr) at glass transitions Tg(x) in the PxGexSe1-2x ternary display a wide, sharp and deep global minimum (~0) in the 0.09 < x < 0.145 range, within which Tg becomes thermally reversing. In the reversibility window these glasses are found not to age, in contrast to aging observed for fragile glass compositions outside the window. Thermal reversibility and lack of aging are paradigms that molecular glasses in the window share with proteins in transition states, which result from structural self-organization in both systems. In proteins the self-organized structures appear to be at places where life sustaining repeating foldings and unfoldings occur.