Reversibility and criticality in amorphous solids.

Nat Commun

Center for Nonlinear Studies and Theoretical Division, Los Alamos National Laboratory, Los Alamos, New Mexico 87545, USA.

Published: November 2015

AI Article Synopsis

  • The study investigates how amorphous solids, which are disordered materials, permanently deform under stress, revealing that this behavior is not fully understood yet.
  • Through molecular dynamics simulations and mean-field theory, researchers found that at a specific strain amplitude, the size of atomic clusters involved in cooperative rearrangements increases significantly, indicating a critical transition.
  • They draw parallels to 'front depinning' transitions from other materials to explain how this transition leads to chaotic motion, suggesting that this chaos arises from the material's inherent disorder rather than being constrained by it.

Article Abstract

The physical processes governing the onset of yield, where a material changes its shape permanently under external deformation, are not yet understood for amorphous solids that are intrinsically disordered. Here, using molecular dynamics simulations and mean-field theory, we show that at a critical strain amplitude the sizes of clusters of atoms undergoing cooperative rearrangements of displacements (avalanches) diverges. We compare this non-equilibrium critical behaviour to the prevailing concept of a 'front depinning' transition that has been used to describe steady-state avalanche behaviour in different materials. We explain why a depinning-like process can result in a transition from periodic to chaotic behaviour and why chaotic motion is not possible in pinned systems. These findings suggest that, at least for highly jammed amorphous systems, the irreversibility transition may be a side effect of depinning that occurs in systems where the disorder is not quenched.

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Source
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4660054PMC
http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/ncomms9805DOI Listing

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