Molecular motions in molecular glasses as studied by thermally stimulated depolarisation currents (TSDC)

The technique of thermally stimulated depolarisation currents (TSDC) was used to study the molecular dynamics in the fragile glass formers salol, glycerol and maltitol, The glass transition relaxation was carefully studied in these materials using the thermal sampling (TS) procedure. It is suggested that the amplitude of the deviation from the zero entropy prediction is related to the fragility of the glass and a definition of fragility based on the TSDC results is proposed. Moreover, a p-relaxation was detected and fully characterised in maltitol. (C) 2000 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.