The frustration-based approach of supercooled liquids and the glass transition: a review and critical assessment

TL;DR

This review critically assesses the frustration-based theoretical approach to understanding the glass transition, highlighting its concepts, achievements, and relation to other theories in explaining the dynamical slowdown in supercooled liquids.

Contribution

It provides a comprehensive review and critical evaluation of the frustration-based theory of the glass transition, emphasizing its conceptual framework and comparative insights.

Findings

Frustration describes incompatibility between local order and space tiling.

The approach offers explanations for the dynamical slowdown in supercooled liquids.

Critical assessment highlights strengths and limitations of the frustration-based theory.

Abstract

One of the most spectacular phenomena in physics in terms of dynamical range is the glass transition and the associated slowing down of flow and relaxation with decreasing temperature. That it occurs in many different liquids seems to call for a "universal" theory. In this article, we review one such theoretical approach which is based on the concept of "frustration". Frustration in this context describes an incompatibility between extension of the locally preferred order in a liquid and tiling of the whole space. We provide a critical assessment of what has been achieved within this approach and we discuss the relation with other theories of the glass transition.