Department of Physics Papers
Document Type
Journal Article
Date of this Version
1-8-2010
Abstract
The role of frustration and quenched disorder in driving the transformation of a crystal into a glass is investigated in quasi-two-dimensional binary colloidal suspensions. Frustration is induced by added smaller particles. The crystal-glass transition is measured to differ from the liquid-glass transition in quantitative and qualitative ways. The crystal-glass transition bears structural signatures similar to those of the crystal-fluid transition: at the transition point, the persistence of orientational order decreases sharply from quasilong range to short range, and the orientational order susceptibility exhibits a maximum. The crystal-glass transition also features a sharp variation in particle dynamics: at the transition point, dynamic heterogeneity grows rapidly, and a dynamic correlation length scale increases abruptly.
Date Posted: 08 November 2010
This document has been peer reviewed.
Comments
Suggested Citation:
Yunker, P., Z. Zhang, and A.G. Yodh. (2010). "Observation of the Disorder-Induced Crystal-to-Glass Transition." Physical Review Letters. 104, 015701.
© The American Physical Society
http://dx.doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevLett.104.015701