Dissertations / Theses on the topic 'Hard Sphere Systems'

This thesis is devoted to several aspects of geometry and morphology in wetting problems and hard sphere packings. First, we propose a new method to simulate wetting and slip on nanostructured substrates: a phase field model associated with a dynamical density theory approach. We showed omniphobicity, meaning repellency, no matter the chemical properties of the liquid on monovalued surfaces, i.e. surfaces without overhangs, which is in contradiction with the macroscopic Cassie-Baxter-Wenzel theory, can produce so-called We checked systematically the impact of the surface parameters on omniphobic repellency, and we show that the key ingredient are line tensions, which emerge from needle shaped surface structures. Geometrical effects have also an important influence on glassy or jammed systems, for example amorphous hard sphere systems in infinite pressure limit. Such hard sphere packings got stuck in a so-called jammed phase, and we shall demonstrate that the local structure in such systems is universal, i.e. independent of the protocol of the generation. For this, robust order parameters - so-called Minkowski tensors - are developed, which overcome robustness deficiencies of widely used order parameters. This leads to a unifying picture of local order parameters, based on geometrical principles. Furthermore, we find with the Minkowski tensor analysis crystallization in jammed sphere packs at the random closed packing point

Le rôle de la structure dans la dynamique colloïdale vitreuse est encore un sujet de débat. Cependant, il existe des preuves d'un lien direct entre les changements de la dynamique et les propriétés structurelles du système. Nous explorons l'interaction de la structure et de la dynamique locales en utilisant des particules à patchs. Pour ce faire, nous utilisons des simulations de dynamique moléculaire. Nous montrons qu'en renforçant la géométrie icosaédrique, le dynamique du système présente un ralentissement extrême. Grâce à ces résultats, nous fournissons une voie pour contrôler la dynamique vitreuse par l'utilisation de particules à patchs. De plus, il est intéressant de savoir si nous pouvons extraire des informations sur la dynamique en utilisant uniquement des informations structurelles. Afin d'explorer ce point, nous simulons une grande variété de mélanges de sphères dures. Nous montrons que la dynamique globale de ces systèmes peut être prédite avec précision en introduisant un nouveau paramètre d'ordre appelé tétraédralité de la structure locale qui compte le nombre de tétraèdres auxquels chaque particule participe. Les prédictions de ce paramètre d'ordre restent valables pour dans une grande variété de densités, ce qui prouve son universalité dans cette famille de précurseurs de verre. De plus, il est également capable de saisir les changements sur la dynamique locale, car les régions à forte tétraédralité sont fortement corrélées avec les régions à dynamique lente. Enfin, nous explorons l'utilisation de techniques d'apprentissage machine non supervisé pour classer les particules ayant des environnements structurels différents
The role played by the structure in determining the dynamics of glassy colloidal systems is still a subject of debate. However, there is compelling evidence of a direct link between changes in the local structure and the dynamical slowdown in glassy systems. Here, we explore the interplay between local structure and dynamics by using patchy particles as glass formers. This is done by making use of molecular dynamics simulations. We show that reinforcing icosahedral geometry causes, the system to exhibit an extreme slowdown in its dynamics. With these results, we provide a route for controlling glassy dynamics through the use of patchy particles. Additionally, an interesting point is whether we can extract information about dynamics from only structural information. In order to explore this point, we simulate a wide variety of hard-sphere mixtures. We show that global dynamics of these systems can be precisely predicted by quantifying the tetrahedrality of the local structure: an order parameter that consists of counting the number of tetrahedra each particle participates in. The predictions of this order parameter maintain their accuracy over a wide variety of densities proving its universality in this family of glass formers. Moreover, it is also capable of capturing the changes in the local dynamics, as regions with high tetrahedrality are strongly correlated with regions with slow dynamics. Finally, we demonstrate that unsupervised machine learning techniques can be used to classify particles with different structural environments, which are strongly correlated to local dynamics

Dans cette thèse nous avons étudié de nombreux aspects de la théorie des systèmes désordonnés. En particulier, nous avons étudié les systèmes vitreux. La description détaillée des systèmes désordonnés et vitreux est un problème ouvert en physique de la matière condensée. Dans le cadre de la théorie de champ moyen pour les verres structuraux nous avons étudié la théorie des fluctuations proche de la transition vitreuse dynamique. L’étude des fluctuations peut etre fait avec le formalisme statique de la théorie de répliques. Nous avons fait cela en introduisant une théorie des champs pour la transition vitreuse à partir du potentiel microscopique entre les particules. Nous avons étudié dans ce cadre les fluctuations au niveau gaussien et nous avons évalués les exposants critiques dans ces approximations. Nous avons aussi étudié la région de validité de la prédiction gaussienne avec l’introduction d’un critère de Ginzburg pour la transition vitreuse. Les résultats que nous avons obtenues ne sont valides que dans la région β. Pour obtenir des resultats dans la région α nous avons étudié la pseudodynamique de Boltzmann que a été introduit par Franz and Parisi. Nous sommes parti des équations de Ornstein-Zernike et nous avons obtenu un ensemble d’équations dynamiques. En utilisant l’approximation Hypernetted Chain nous avons obtenu un ensemble complet d’équations qui sont très similaires aux équations de la théorie de mode-coupling. La troisième partie de la thèse porte sur l’étude des états amorphes des sphères dures en hautes dimensions. Pour obtenir les exposants dynamique dans ce cas, nous avons étudié la stabilité du diagramme de phase 1RSB (one-step-replica-symmetry-breaking). Nous avons découvert que ce diagramme de phase possède une région où la solution 1RSB est instable. La région où la solution 1RSB est instable est connectée avec la description théorique de la physique de jamming des sphères dures et nous avons montré que l’instabilité 1RSB est responsable d’une transition de phase en haute densité. Cette transition s’appelle la transition de Gardner. Nous avons cherché une solution 2RSB et nous avons vu qu’il existait un point en densité après lequel on peut avoir une solution 2RSB (et aussi fullRSB). Nous avons étudié le diagramme de phase 2RSB dans la limite de jamming où la pression devient infini. Après la solution 2RSB nous avons cherché à décrire la solution fullRSB. Nous avons écrit les équations fullRSB et nous avons découvert qu’elles sont identiques aux equations que l’on a dans le cas de un modèle de verres de spins qui s’appelle modèle de Sherrington et Kirkpatrick. Nous avons aussi étudié la solution numerique des équations fullRSB dans la limite de jamming. Cette solution montre beaucoup des choses intéressantes. La plus importante est le comportement du mean square displacement dans la limite de jamming. Si l’on regard les résultats numériques et éxperimentaux, il semble que le plateau de le mean square displacement s’approche a zero comme la pression à un exposant proche de −3/2. Nous avons vu que la solution numérique des équations fullRSB est en mesure de reproduire ce comportement. La quatrième partie de la thése a porté sur la dynamique de mode-coupling dans le régime où la transition vitreuse devient continue
In this thesis we have studied many aspects of the physics of disordered and glassy systems. The first part of the work is about the theory of dynamical fluctuations in the beta regime. When a system undergoes a dynamical arrest, it can be studied by introducing an appropriate dynamical correlation function that plays the role of the order parameter of the transition. To understand the collective effects underlying the glass transition we have studied the fluctuations of the order parameter on a time scale where the system is relaxed in a typical metastable glassy state. To do this we have seen that coming from the glass phase the system develops critical fluctuations with a diverging correlation length at the mean field level. We have thus derived an effective field theory by focusing only on them. This field theory can be used firstly to derive the mode-coupling exponent parameter that controls the relaxation of the dynamical correlation function when the system relaxes in a metastable glassy state. Moreover we can give a Ginzburg Criterion that can be used to determine the region of validity of the Gaussian approximation. These considerations are valid in the beta regime. To clarify what happens in the alpha regime we have studied a quasi-equilibrium construction, called Boltzmann-Pseudodynamics, recently introduced in order to describe with static techniques the long time regime of glassy dynamics. We have extended this formalism to structural glasses by producing a new set of dynamical equations. We have done this in the simplest approximation scheme that is called Hypernetted Chain. Two results have been obtained : firstly, we have computed the mode-coupling exponent parameter and we have shown that it coincides with the one obtained with the formalism of the first part of the thesis ; secondly we have studied the aging regime and we have derived that the condition that determines the fluctuation-dissipation ratio is a marginal stability one. In the third part of the thesis we have studied the theory of amorphous states of hard spheres in high dimensions. Hard spheres provide simple models of glasses and they are extensively studied for the jamming transition. In our framework jammed states can be thought as infinite pressure limit of metastable glassy states. During the last years it has been derived a mean field theory of hard spheres based on the 1RSB assumption on the structure of the free energy landscape. However it has been realized that this construction is inconsistent for what concerns the property of the packings at jamming. In the present work we have firstly investigated the possibility of an instability of the 1RSB solution and we have actually found that the 1RSB solution is unstable in the jamming part of the phase diagram. At the same time we have been able to compute the mode-coupling exponent parameter for this system. In order to go beyond the 1RSB solution we have first tried a 2RSB ansatz and then a fullRSB solution. We have derived a set of variational equations that are very close to the ones that have been derived in the Sherrington-Kirkpatrick model. We have solved numerically the equations and we have shown that the fullRSB solution seems to predict that the plateau value of the mean square displacement scale as the pressure to a power close to 3/2 as it seems to be predicted by scaling arguments and in contrast with the 1RSB predictions that show a scaling with the inverse of the pressure. The last chapter of the thesis is on the mode-coupling theory when the glass transition is becoming continuous. We have been able to show that in such a situation a detailed characterization of the solution of the equations can be obtained in the long time regime

When a liquid is cooled below its equilibrium freezing temperature, it becomes supercooled and the molecular motions slow down until the system becomes kinetically arrested, forming a glass, at the glass transition temperature. These amorphous materials have the mechanical properties of a solid while retaining the structural properties of a liquid, but do not exhibit the usual features of a thermodynamic phase transition. As such, they present a number of important challenges to our understanding of the dynamics and thermodynamics of condensed phases. For example, supercooled liquids are classified on the basis of the temperature dependence of their transport properties and structural relaxations times. Strong liquids display an Arrhenius behavior, with the logarithm of their viscosity growing linearly with inverse temperature. Fragile liquids behave in a super-Arrhenius manner, where the viscosity appears to diverge at temperatures above absolute zero, suggesting the possibility of an underlying thermodynamic origin to the glass transition. Some complex, network forming liquids, such as water and silica have also been shown to have a dynamical crossover from fragile to strong liquid behavior as the temperature is decreased. The potential energy landscape paradigm, combined with inherent structure formalism, provide a framework for connecting the way particles pack together with the thermodynamics and dynamics of the liquid and glassy phases. However, the complexity of this multi-dimensional surface makes it difficult to fully characterize and rigorous relationships between the nature of particle packing and glass forming properties have not been established. The goal of this thesis is to study some of the general features of glass transition and find the connection between the dynamics and the thermodynamics of glass forming liquids. To this end, the packing landscapes of quasi-one-dimensional hard discs and hard spheres are studied. A two dimensional system of hard discs with diameter σ, confined between two hard walls (lines) of length L, separated by a distance 1