Phys. Rev. Lett. 104, 105701 (2010) [4 pages]Geometry of Slow Structural Fluctuations in a Supercooled Binary AlloyReceived 19 November 2009; published 9 March 2010 The liquid structure of a glass-forming binary alloy is studied using molecular dynamics simulations. The analysis employs the geometrical approach of Frank and Kasper to establish that the supercooled liquid contains extended clusters characterized by the same short range order as the crystal. The steep increase in the heat capacity on cooling is directly coupled to the growing fluctuations of the Frank-Kasper clusters. The relaxation of particles in the clusters dominates the slow tail of the self-intermediate scattering function. © 2010 The American Physical Society URL:
http://link.aps.org/doi/10.1103/PhysRevLett.104.105701
DOI:
10.1103/PhysRevLett.104.105701
PACS:
64.70.pm, 61.20.Ja, 61.43.Fs, 64.70.qd
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