Aging, Jamming and the Mechanisms of Marginal Stability in Amorphous Solids

The random first order transition theory of glasses provides a route to understanding not only the dynamics of the supercooled liquid state, but also the history dependent properties of nonequilibrium amorphous states, i.e., glasses. I will review its implications for preparing marginally stable amorphous packings as well as the dynamic implications of the competing existence of thermodynamically stable periodic crystals for obtaining such amorphous assemblies.