Growing length scales in a supercooled liquid close to an interface

Abstract

We present the results of molecular dynamics computer simulations of a simple glass former close to an interface between the liquid and the frozen amorphous phase of the same material. By investigating F _s (q, z, t), the incoherent intermediate scattering function for particles that have a distance z from the wall, we show that the relaxation dynamics of the particles close to the wall are much slower than those for particles far away from the wall. For small z the typical relaxation time for F_s (q, z, t) increases as exp [Δ/(z - z _p)], where Δ and z _p are constants. We use the location of the crossover from this law to the bulk behaviour to define a first length scale [ztilde]. A different length scale is defined by considering the Ansatz F _s(q, z, t) = F _s ^bulk(q, t) + a(t) exp {-[z/ξ(t)]^β(1)}, where a(t), ξ(t) and β(t) are fit parameters. We show that this Ansatz gives a very good description of the data for all times and all values of z. The length ξ(t) increases for short and intermediate times and decreases again on the time scale of the α relaxation of the system. The maximum value of ξ(t) can thus be defined as a new length scale ξ_max. We find that [ztilde] as well as ξ_max increase with decreasing temperature. The temperature dependence of this increase is compatible with a divergence of the length scale at the Kauzmann temperature of the bulk system.