8th Liquid Matter Conference September 6-10, 2011 Wien, Austria ...

P8.50Thu 811:10-14:00Study of the kinetics of liquid-liquid transition intriphenyl phosphiteRyotaro Shimizu, 1 Mika Kobayashi, 1 and Hajime Tanaka 11 University of Tokyo, Komaba 4-6-1, Meguro-ku, Tokyo, 153-8505, Tokyo, JapanThe first-order transition between different liquid states in a single-component liquid is called a”liquid-liquid phase transition”. A supercooled state of a molecular liquid, triphenyl phosphate,shows an anomalous first-order transition between two disordered states and it has been identifiedas a liquid-liquid transition because of some features strongly suggesting the liquid nature ofthe final state: The final state has no long-range order and exhibits a distinct glass transitiontemperature, which is different from T g of the initial liquid (liquid I) [1]. Furthermore, thistransition has a few interesting features in its kinetics. It takes hours to complete the transition andthis transformation time monotonically increases with decreasing the annealing temperatures. Inthis study, we examined the transition kinetics of liquid-liquid transition by combining the timeresolvedstatic light scattering, phase contrast microscopy, and differential scanning calorimetrymeasurements. By comparing the experimental results with the results of numerical simulationsbased on a phenomenological coarse-grained model (model A), we show that the transitionkinetics is governed by a scalar, non-conserved order parameter and that the transport coefficientwhich governs the dynamics of liquid-liquid transition is strongly affected by the slowing downassociated with the glass transition of liquid I. In addition, by simultaneous measurements of VVand HV light scatterings, we found that a few micrometer-sized spherulites are created during thetransition (only) when the annealing temperature is rather high. From these results, we discuss thenature of liquid-liquid transition in this molecular liquid.[1] H. Tanaka, R. Kurita, H. Mataki, Phys. Rev. Lett. 92, 25701(2004)50