  We unveil the existence of non-affinely rearranging regions in the inherent
structures (IS) of supercooled liquids by numerical simulations of two- and
three-dimensional model glass formers subject to static shear deformations
combined with local energy minimizations. In the liquid state IS, we find a
broad distribution of rather large rearrangements which are correlated only
over small distances. At low temperatures, the onset of the cooperative
dynamics corresponds to much smaller displacements correlated over larger
distances. This finding indicates the presence of non-affinely rearranging
domains of relevant size in the IS deformation, which can be seen as the static
counterpart of the cooperatively rearranging regions in the dynamics. This idea
provides new insight into possible structural signatures of slow cooperative
dynamics of supercooled liquids and supports the connections with elastic
heterogeneities found in amorphous solids.
