Abstract We take familiar inorganic oxide glasses and non-oxide glasses and the liquids from which they derive to review the current understanding of their atomic structure, ranging from the local environments of individual atoms to the long-range order which can cover many interatomic distances. The structural characteristics of important glasses and melts, like silicates, borates, alumino-silicates, halides and chalcogenides, are drawn from the results of recent spectroscopy and scattering experiments. The techniques include Nuclear Magnetic Resonance (NMR) and X-ray Absorption Fine Structure (XAFS), Neutron Scattering (NS) and Small- and Wide-angle X-ray Scattering measurements (SAXS/WAXS), and are often combined with computer simulation experiments in order to obtain detailed images of structure and diffusion in the glassy as well as in the molten state. We then review the current understanding of relaxation in glasses, liquids and polyamorphic states. This includes phenomenological models and theories of relaxation in different dynamical regimes, spectroscopic studies of atomic-scale mechanisms of viscous flow in inorganic glass-formers and the signatures of relaxational behaviour embedded in the low-frequency vibrational dynamics of glasses including the Boson peak and the Two-Level Systems (TLS) that control conformational transformation. We conclude this review by extending concepts of the dynamics of the glass transition from the supercooled liquid in order to understand the solid-state amorphization of crystals under temperature and pressure and to determine the thermodynamic limits of the crystalline and glassy state. Acknowledgements The authors thank the following for helpful discussions: Bruce Aitken, Austen Angell, Punit Boolchand, Uli Buchenau, Jűrgen Horbach, Jorge Íñiguez, Himanshu Jain, Alexander Kolobov, Philipp Maass, Florian Menau, Alexandra Navrotsky, Peter Poole, Andrei Sokolov, Yann Vaills and Martin Wilding. One of the authors (GNG) acknowledges the support of the Higher Education Funding Council for Wales through the Centre for Advanced Functional Materials and Devices. Both authors are grateful to the International Materials Institute on New Functionality in Glass – NSF Grant No. DMR-0409588 – for support in writing this review. One author (SS) also acknowledges support of NSF Grant No. DMR-0603933 for the preparation of this review.

George Greaves

S. Sen

Advances In Physics

ADVANCES IN PHYSICS 发表专家对凝聚态物理学家感兴趣和重要的主题的权威评论。它适用于对期刊领域有基本知识的积极读者，旨在从作者的角度引出所审查主题的要点。该期刊的范围包括凝聚态物理和统计力学：广义上包括与量子信息、冷原子、软物质物理和生物物理学的重叠。读者群：大学、工业和研究机构的物理学家、材料科学家和物理化学家。

The journal "Advances in Physics" publishes authoritative reviews on important topics of interest to condensed matter physicists. It is aimed at actively engaged readers who possess a fundamental understanding of the field, providing insights from the authors' perspectives. The scope of the journal includes condensed matter physics and statistical mechanics, broadly encompassing overlaps with quantum information, cold atoms, soft matter physics, and biophysics. The readership primarily consists of physicists, materials scientists, and physical chemists from universities, industry, and research institutions.

《Advances in Physics》期刊发表关于凝聚态物理学领域重要主题的权威评论，旨在为具备基本知识的读者提供深入的见解。期刊内容涵盖凝聚态物理和统计力学，广泛涉及量子信息、冷原子、软物质物理和生物物理学等交叉领域。其读者群体主要包括大学、工业界和研究机构的物理学家、材料科学家以及物理化学家。

Category	Quartile
物理与天体物理	1
物理与天体物理, 物理凝聚态物理	1

Inorganic glasses, glass-forming liquids and amorphizing solids

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Journal Info

Category	Quartile
PHYSICS, CONDENSED MATTER	1