Activated processes and Inherent Structure dynamics of finite-size mean-field models for glasses

¹ Dipartimento di Fisica, Università di Roma "La Sapienza” and INFM Unità di Roma I - P.le Aldo Moro 2, I-00185 Roma, Italy
² Physics Department, Faculty of Physics, University of Barcelona Diagonal 647, 08028 Barcelona, Spain

Received: 23 June 2000
Accepted: 11 October 2000

Abstract

We investigate the Inherent Structure (IS) dynamics of mean-field finite-size spin-glass models whose high-temperature dynamics is described in the thermodynamic limit by the schematic Mode Coupling Theory for supercooled liquids. Near the threshold energy the dynamics is ruled by activated processes which induce a logarithmic slow relaxation. We show the presence of aging in both the IS correlation and integrated response functions and check the validity of the one-step replica symmetry breaking scenario in the presence of activated processes. Our work shows: 1) the violation of the fluctuation-dissipation theorem can be computed from the configurational entropy obtained in the Stillinger and Weber approach, 2) the intermediate time regime () in mean-field theory automatically includes activated processes opening the way to analytically investigate activated processes by computing corrections beyond mean field.