Relaxation of a Surface Scratch by Viscous Flow

Abstract
The Fourier‐Moment method developed by King and Mullins has been applied to the case of an isolated scratch decaying by viscous flow in an amorphous material such as a simple glass. Using the Stokes‐Einstein equation to relate the diffusivity and viscosity coefficients, a comparison of rates suggests that viscous flow would predominate over volume or surface diffusion as the mechanism of scratch healing in simple amorphous materials for scratch widths above approximately 0.1 μ.