Glassy Systems

Understanding the glass transition and enormous slowdown of structural relaxation timescales in molecular liquids, colloids and polymers remain a major unsolved problem in condensed matter physics, physical chemistry and material science with high practical relevance. Despite years of experimental, simulation and theoretical efforts, massive slowdown of glass forming liquids continues to challenge modern scientists. Some common ‘unsolved or, debated areas’ include understanding how activation barriers emerge and change with temperature and chemistry, what dynamic co-operativity means at the molecular level, space-time dynamic heterogeneity and heterogeneous relaxation, diffusion-relaxation or viscosity decoupling phenomena, bifurcation of the alpha and beta-processes, the nature and importance (or not) of the boson peak, role of deformation on the structural relaxation, diffusion, and nonlinear mechanical response of diverse glass forming materials, mechanism of physical aging and its dependence on stress or strain, microscopic role of strong short range attractions in soft matter systems, among many others.