Lattice model of dynamic heterogeneity and kinetic arrest in glass-forming liquids

We present a new model of glass-forming liquids in which free volume fluctuations drive dynamic heterogeneity and diffusion of mobility. Our kinetic model is developed from a microscopic perspective where free volume creation requires existing free volume nearby as a source of mobility; free volume diffusion and destruction is spontaneous by virtue of its own mobility. Simulations indicate "molten" and kinetically arrested "glassy" regions in parameter space, and a critical point where dynamic length and intermittency time scales grow as power laws. Systems near the critical point contain colonies of free volume that propagate around bubbles of glassified material.