How to "measure" a structural relaxation time that is too long to be measured?

Abstract

It has recently become possible to prepare ultrastable glassy materials characterised by structural relaxation times which vastly exceed the duration of any feasible experiment. Similarly, new algorithms have led to the production of ultrastable computer glasses. Is it possible to obtain a reliable estimate of a structural relaxation time that is too long to be measured? We review, organise, and critically discuss various methods to estimate very long relaxation times. We also perform computer simulations of three dimensional ultrastable hard spheres glasses to test and quantitatively compare some of these methods for a single model system. The various estimation methods disagree significantly and it is not yet clear how to accurately estimate extremely long relaxation times.

17 pages, 10 figures; version accepted for publication at J. Chem. Phys

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• Characterising the slow dynamics of the swap Monte Carlo algorithm
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• Initial Stages of Rejuvenation of Vapor-Deposited Glasses during Isothermal Annealing: Contrast Between Experiment and Simulation