Orientational ordering induced by shear deformation in an amorphous Lennard-Jones solid

An amorphous Lennard-Jones solid has been severely deformed in a shearing manner by using computer molecular-statics techniques. The orientational order parameter Q₆ is significantly increased before the onset of the shear localization. Computer-generated optical diffraction patterns show that a phase with explicit sixfold symmetry in one projection, and with fourfold and twofold symmetry in the other two projections (a tendency towards a close-packed layer structure) appears in the severely deformed system. The radial distribution functions, however, show no apparent crystallization occurring.