Quantum polyamorphism in compressed distinguishable helium-4 Available to Purchase

We demonstrate that two amorphous solid states can exist in ⁴He consisting of distinguishable Boltzmann atoms under compressed conditions. The isothermal compression of normal or supercritical fluid ⁴He was conducted at 3–25 K using the isobaric–isothermal path integral centroid molecular dynamics simulation. The compression of fluid first produced the low-dispersion amorphous (LDA) state possessing modest extension of atomic necklaces. Further isothermal compression up to the order of 10 kbar to 1 Mbar or an isobaric cooling of LDA induced the transition to the high-dispersion amorphous (HDA) state. The HDA was characterized by long quantum wavelengths of atoms extended over several Angstroms and the promotion of atomic residual diffusion. They were related to the quantum tunneling of atoms bestriding the potential saddle points in this glass. The change in pressure or temperature induced the LDA–HDA transition reversibly with hysteresis, while it resembled the coil–globule transition of classical polymers. The HDA had lower kinetic and higher Gibbs free energies than the LDA at close temperature. The HDA was absent at T ≥ 13 K, while the LDA–HDA transition pressure significantly decreased with lowering temperature. The LDA and HDA correspond to the trapped and tunneling regimes proposed by Markland et al. [J. Chem. Phys. 136, 074511 (2012)], respectively. The same reentrant behavior as they found was observed for the expansion factor of the quantum wavelength as well as for atomic diffusivity.