Specific-heat relaxation in glycerol

The frequency dependence of the specific heat observed by Birge and Nagel in supercooled glycerol is found to obey fractional power laws in the high- and low-frequency limits. The relaxation of the specific heat has been interpreted in terms of the Dissado-Hill many-body theory. The evaluated values of the exponents suggest a relatively high degree of local correlations (n=0.43) and a low degree of long-range correlations (m=0.73) of the motions responsible for the relaxation observed. Agreement of the n and m parameters with those calculated from dielectric and acoustic relaxation data is found. The possibility of introducing fractal concepts into the description of relaxation phenomena in glycerol is pointed out.