Mechanism and kinetics of the reversible transformation lda-hda of amorphous ice under pressure

An ultrasonic investigation of pressure-induced direct and reverse transformations lda-hda between the amorphous phases of low-and high-density ice is performed and the change in the shear modulus is determined. It is found that elastic softening of the amorphous network precedes both transformations, and the behavior of lda phase is similar to that of hexagonal 1h ice before amorphization. At the same time a number of features of the lda-hda transformation are due to the topological disordering of the amorphous phases, and the kinetics of the transformation is different from the standard behavior at a first-order phase transition and also from the compression kinetics of “ classic” glasses of the type a-SiO₂ and a-GeO2. It is shown that the difference in the behavior of the lda and hda amorphous phases under pressure can be attributed to characteristic features of their spectra of low-energy two-level states. Pis’ma Zh. éksp. Teor. Fiz. 69, No. 9, 653–658 (10 May 1999)