Revealing a hidden dynamic signature of the non-Arrhenius crossover in metallic glass-forming liquids

Abstract

We report a scaling collapse of the temperature dependence of structural relaxation in 12 model metallic glass-forming liquids by introducing a characteristic temperature and characteristic time scale under constant dynamic heterogeneity condition. Moreover, we find the onset temperature of cooperative motions, TA, separating Arrhenius and non-Arrhenius behaviors of the relaxation time turns out to be one of the characteristic temperatures, which is evidenced by the constant dynamic heterogeneity at TA for all systems investigated. Our findings reveal a new dynamic signature hidden in TA and offer a new perspective, i.e., constant dynamic heterogeneity condition, to study metallic glass-forming liquids.