{"record":{"author":{"account_ref":null,"orcid":null},"builds_on":[],"content_schema":"pubphys.content.revision/1","content_sha256":"87c50f90c1c54fd19e81af6559288d2eca4db3e738da8c0e6a16edc31600a599","created":"2026-10-15T23:43:22Z","files":[],"origin":{"assisted_by":[],"kind":"seed"},"parents":["60848fcc6e7dd814281e81cd02da7522c13d62ffd19f44653a61c8b90744fb32","ce59fb6cd812fc05906d0c60a71c75ea22bc686bcf38e7c3ef7010834d98ee7b"],"salt":"6a0d541ebcadc75a68bbe8e2c7291d303421a6af5773ec137798a64c158e21c3","schema":"pubphys.record/2","site":"pubphys.com","target":null,"type":"revision"},"content":{"answer_type":"mechanism","assisted_by":[],"external_id":"bio.glass-transition.origin-of-slowdown","kind":"phenomenon","literature_status":"contested","n":"2","parents":[],"plain":"As a glass-forming liquid is cooled, the time its molecules take to rearrange grows by about 14 powers of ten over a narrow temperature range, much faster than the simple Arrhenius law (a fixed energy barrier) predicts. Which microscopic mechanism produces this growth is unknown.","posed_since":"","precise":"In molecular glass formers the structural relaxation time $\\tau_\\alpha(T)$ grows from about $10^{-12}\\ \\mathrm{s}$ in the high-temperature liquid to about $10^{2}\\ \\mathrm{s}$ at $T_g$, with an effective activation energy that increases on cooling; model liquids (Kob-Andersen Lennard-Jones mixture, polydisperse soft spheres) reproduce the onset of this growth. Competing explanations include random first-order transition theory (entropy-driven cooperative rearrangements), dynamic facilitation (kinetically constrained localized excitations) and elastic or frustration-based models. An answer is a theory that predicts $\\tau_\\alpha(T)$ and the associated growing length scales from the interaction potential and is singled out against the alternatives by equilibrium simulations near and below the experimental $T_g$. This is the root question of the topic; its working content is split into the sharper problems linked to it.","problem_ref":"60848fcc6e7dd814281e81cd02da7522c13d62ffd19f44653a61c8b90744fb32","references":"","settled_by":"A theory whose quantitative predictions for $\\tau_{\\alpha}(T)$, $\\xi(T)$ and their relation are confirmed, and those of rival theories refuted, in swap-Monte-Carlo-equilibrated simulations below the experimental $T_{g}$.","status_note":"Swap Monte Carlo has equilibrated model liquids below the experimental $T_{g}$ since about 2017, but as of 2026 no test has eliminated the main competing theories.","title":"What causes the super-Arrhenius slowdown of supercooled liquids?","topic_ref":null},"attested":{"attestation":{"batch":null,"client_id":null,"id_token_sha256":null,"kind":"platform"},"record_hash":"6e99368d2508339c52843d535767a509cb33589d14719f67b5d14b6e79d435d2","schema":"pubphys.attested/1"},"envelope":{"attested_hash":"a3294f4ca4ee981632cc72c0637b6baae341a05cb09f378bdb1b2e92159f8da0","platform_signature":{"key_id":"c6afc19b31429869751f06879c75cd64ea92654423d15b44be775bf1310a60da","sig":"RJEdCj4Wnrqy8wxc3hQjXyc_atTpotoro62PoLTI9wkLsPc3po5vaQySc5BWJbLPqEhKaNijp6el2YtW-QgbCw"},"schema":"pubphys.envelope/1"},"record_hash":"6e99368d2508339c52843d535767a509cb33589d14719f67b5d14b6e79d435d2","leaf_index":2576}