Dynamical Heterogeneities In Glasses Colloids And Granular Media

Most of the solid materials we use in everyday life, from plastics to cosmetic gels exist under a non-crystalline, amorphous form: they are glasses. Yet, we are still seeking a fundamental explanation as to what glasses really are and to why they form. In this book, we survey the most recent theoretical and experimental research dealing with glassy physics, from molecular to colloidal glasses and granular media. Leading experts in this field present broad and original perspectives on one of the deepest mysteries of condensed matter physics, with an emphasis on the key role played by heterogeneities in the dynamics of glassiness.

This book presents a compilation of self-contained chapters covering a wide range of topics within the broad field of soft condensed matter. Each chapter starts with basic definitions to bring the reader up-to-date on the topic at hand, describing how to use fluid flows to generate soft materials of high value either for applications or for basic research. Coverage includes topics related to colloidal suspensions and soft materials and how they differ in behavior, along with a roadmap for researchers on how to use soft materials to study relevant physics questions related to geometrical frustration.

Deep connections are emerging in the physics of non-thermal systems,such as granular media, and other "complex systems" such as glass formers, spin glasses, colloids or gels. This book discusses the unifying physical theories, developed in recent years, for the description of these systems. The special focus of the book is on recent important developments in the formulation of a Statistical Mechanics approach to granular media and the description of out-of-equilibrium dynamics, such as "jamming" phenomena, ubiquitous in these "complex systems". The book collects contributions from leading researchers in these fields, providing both an introduction, at a graduate level, to these rapidly developing subjects and featuring an up to date, self contained, presentation of theoretical and experimental developments for researchers in areas ranging from Chemistry, to Engineering and Physical Sciences. · the book discusses very hot topics in physical sciences· it includes contributions from the most prominent researchers in the area· it is clearly written and self contained

Advances in the Chemistry and Physics of Materials is a compilation of topics on the recent developments in the areas of Materials Science.Materials Science has been a subject of major interest which has garnered significant attention over the years. Chemists and physicists have contributed extensively to this frontier research area and their synergistic efforts have led to the discovery of many new, exciting materials involving novel functions. In the light of the growing importance of the field of Materials Science, and owing to the fact that it is a subject that holds a lot of promise, internationally renowned Materials Chemist Prof. C.N.R Rao along with his colleagues at the School of Advanced Materials, at JNCASR, have compiled the contents of this book to highlight and showcase the emerging trends in materials science.It touches upon topics spanning over nanomaterials and various other classes of energy materials for harvesting, storage and conversion. The relatively new and exciting range of materials such as supramolecular, soft and biomaterials have been introduced and elucidated, in the book. Special emphasis has been laid on the synthesis, phenomena and characterization of these kinds of materials. Theoretical and Computational Chemistry has played an important role in the growth of Materials Science as a discipline, and the book covers a special topical session on the theoretical efforts in materials research.The book, packed with theory and practical aspects in a crisp and concise manner, aims to take the reader on an intense scientific expedition. The compilation provides an insight into the chemistry and physics of materials and presents up-to-date status reports which would, undoubtedly, be useful to practitioners, teachers and students.

Mobility Gradient of Polystyrene in Films Supported on Solid Substrates, by Yoshihisa Fujii, Hiroshi Morita, Atsushi Takahara and Keiji Tanaka Probing Properties of Polymers in Thin Films Via Dewetting, by Günter Reiter Heterogeneous and Aging Dynamics in Single and Stacked Thin Polymer Films, by Koji Fukao, Takehide Terasawa, Kenji Nakamura, Daisuke Tahara Heterogeneous Dynamics of Polymer Thin Films as Studied by Neutron Scattering, by Rintaro Inoue and Toshiji Kanaya

A complete and timely overview of the topic, this Encyclopedia imparts knowledge of fundamental principles and their applications for academicians, scientists and researchers, while informing engineers, industrialists and entrepreneurs of the current state of the technology and its utilization. The most comprehensive source on polymer blends available on the market Offers a complete and timely overview of the topic Each article presents up to date research & development on a topic and its basic principles and applications, integrates case studies, laboratory and pilot plant experiments, and gives due reference to published and patented literature Equips academics, scientists and researchers with knowledge of fundamentals principles and their applications, and informs the engineers, industrialists and entrepreneurs about the state of the art technology and its applications

This thesis provides the first successful study of jump diffusion processes in glasses on the atomic scale, utilizing a novel coherent technique. This new method, called atomic-scale X-ray Photon Correlation Spectroscopy or aXPCS, has only recently been proven to be able to capture diffusion processes with atomic resolution in crystal systems. With this new toolkit for studying atomic diffusion in amorphous systems, new insight into basic processes in a wide range of technically relevant materials, like fast ionic conductors, can be obtained.

"the present book will be of great value for both newcomers to the field and mature active researchers by serving as a coherent and timely introduction to some of the modern approaches, ideas, results, emerging understanding, and many open questions in this fascinating field of polymer glasses, supercooled liquids, and thin films" –Kenneth S. Schweizer, Morris Professor of Materials Science & Engineering, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (from the Foreword) This book provides a timely and comprehensive overview of molecular level insights into polymer glasses in confined geometries and under deformation. Polymer glasses have become ubiquitous to our daily life, from the polycarbonate eyeglass lenses on the end of our nose to large acrylic glass panes holding water in aquarium tanks, with advantages over glass in that they are lightweight and easy to manufacture, while remaining transparent and rigid. The contents include an introduction to the field, as well as state of the art investigations. Chapters delve into studies of commonalities across different types of glass formers (polymers, small molecules, colloids, and granular materials), which have enabled microscopic and molecular level frameworks to be developed. The authors show how glass formers are modeled across different systems, thereby leading to treatments for polymer glasses with first-principle based approaches and molecular level detail. Readers across disciplines will benefit from this topical overview summarizing the key areas of polymer glasses, alongside an introduction to the main principles and approaches.

This thesis presents a theoretical analysis of the behavior of glasses under external perturbations, i.e. compression and shear straining. Written in a pedagogical style, it explains every facet of the problem in detail, including many crucial steps that cannot be found in the existing literature—making it particularly useful for students and as an introduction to the subject of glassy physics. In glassy systems the behavior under external compression and shear-strain is quite peculiar. Many complex phenomena are observed and grasping them fully would be a major step toward a complete theory of the glass transition. This thesis makes important advances in this direction, analyzing the behavior of glassy states in painstaking detail and reproducing it in the framework of a recently developed mean field theory for glasses that has proven extremely successful for jamming, demonstrating its predictive power in the context of metastable glassy states obtained through nonequilibrium protocols.