Calorimetric determination of fragility in glass forming liquids: T(f) vs. T(g-onset) methods.

The calorimetric determination of the fragility m-index is compared using the T f and T g-onset methods for typical metallic and molecular glass forming systems of Pd39Ni10Cu30P21, glycerol, triacetin and propylene carbonate. The results are evaluated by referring to the standard m-values determined from the kinetic measurements of the viscosity or structural relaxation time in the supercooled liquid regimes. The m-indexes derived from the T f method are found to generally agree well with the kinetic measurements for all the systems. However, a large deviation is shown between the m-indexes calculated with the T g-onset method and the kinetic results for the fragile liquids of triacetin and propylene carbonate, indicating the calorimetric determination of the fragility m-indexes in terms of the T f method produces less uncertainty.