Rheological model for the alpha relaxation of glass-forming liquids and its comparison to data for DC704 and DC705

Abstract

Dynamic shear-modulus data are presented for two silicone oils DC704 and DC705 for frequencies between 1 mHz and 10 kHz at temperatures covering more than five decades of relaxation-time variation. Data are fitted to the alpha part of a phenomenological model previously shown to describe well the dynamic shear modulus of squalane, which has a large beta process [Hecksher et al., J. Chem. Phys. 146, 154504 (2017)]. That model is characterized by additivity of the alpha and beta shear compliance and by a high-frequency decay of the alpha process in proportion to ω−1/2, where ω is the angular frequency. The fits of the alpha part of this model to the DC704 and DC705 data are compared to fits by a Havriliak–Negami type model, a Barlow–Erginsav–Lamb model, and a Cole–Davidson type model. At all temperatures, the best fit is obtained by the alpha part of the squalane model. This strengthens the conjecture that so-called [Formula: see text]-relaxation, leading to high-frequency loss decays proportional to ω−1/2, is generic to the alpha relaxation of supercooled liquids [J. C. Dyre, Phys. Rev. E 74, 021502 (2006); Nielsen et al., J. Chem. Phys. 130, 154508 (2009); and Pabst et al., J. Phys. Chem. Lett. 12, 3685–3690 (2021)].