Wave Attenuation In Glasses: Rayleigh And Generalized-Rayleigh Scattering Scaling

The attenuation of long-wavelength phonons (waves) by glassy disorder plays a central role in various glass anomalies, yet it is neither fully characterized nor fully understood. Of particular importance is the scaling of the attenuation rate Gamma(k) with small wavenumbers k -> 0 in the thermodynamic limit of macroscopic glasses. Here, we use a combination of theory and extensive computer simulations to show that the macroscopic low-frequency behavior emerges at intermediate frequencies in finite-size glasses, above a recently identified crossover wavenumber k(dagger), where phonons are no longer quantized into bands. For k < k(dagger), finite-size effects dominate Gamma(k), which is quantitatively described by a theory of disordered phonon bands. For k > k(dagger), we find that Gamma(k) is affected by the number of quasilocalized nonphononic excitations, a generic signature of glasses that feature a universal density of states. In particular, we show that in a frequency range in which this number is small, Gamma(k) follows a Rayleigh scattering scaling similar to k over bar d+1 ( over bar d is the spatial dimension) and that in a frequency range in which this number is sufficiently large, the recently observed generalized-Rayleigh scaling of the form similar to k over bar d+1 log(k(0)/k) emerges (k(0) > k(dagger) is a characteristic wavenumber). Our results suggest that macroscopic glasses-and, in particular, glasses generated by conventional laboratory quenches that are known to strongly suppress quasilocalized nonphononic excitations-exhibit Rayleigh scaling at the lowest wavenumbers k and a crossover to generalized-Rayleigh scaling at higher k. Some supporting experimental evidence from recent literature is presented.