Dynamic theory of correlations in strongly coupled, classical one-component plasmas: Glass transition in the generalized viscoelastic formalism.

Abstract

A new theory of dynamic correlations in a strongly coupled, classical one-component plasma (OCP) is developed within the generalized viscoelastic formalism. Fully convergent kinetic equations for the strongly coupled OCP are thereby derived with the aid of a fluctuation-theoretic formulation of the collision integrals. The dynamic structure factor S(k,\ensuremath{\omega}) and the coefficient \ensuremath{\eta} of shear viscosity are calculated both in the ordinary fluid state and in the metastable supercooled state through a self-consistent solution to the kinetic equation. It is shown that the numerical results in the ordinary fluid state agree well with other theoretical and molecular-dynamics simulation results. A possibility of the dynamic glass transition is predicted in the supercooled OCP through the analyses of the variation in \ensuremath{\eta}, the quasielastic peak in S(k,\ensuremath{\omega}) and the behavior of the self-diffusion coefficient; the prediction is compared with those in the glass-transition theories for other systems. Relevance to laboratory experiment is examined in terms of the metastable-state lifetimes against homogeneous nucleation of the crystalline state.