Attractive versus truncated repulsive supercooled liquids: The dynamics is encoded in the pair correlation function

Understand

We compare glassy dynamics in two liquids that differ in the form of their interaction potentials.

• Both systems have the same repulsive interactions but one has also an attractive part in the potential.
• These two systems exhibit very different dynamics despite having nearly identical pair correlation functions.
• We demonstrate that a properly weighted integral of the pair correlation function, which amplifies the subtle differences between the two systems, correctly captures their dynamical differences.