  In this work we study structural recovery of a soft glassy Laponite
suspension by monitoring temporal evolution of elastic modulus under isothermal
conditions as well as following step temperature jumps. Interestingly,
evolution behavior under isothermal conditions indicates the rate, and not the
path of structural recovery, to be dependent on temperature. The experiments
carried out under temperature jump conditions however trace a different path of
structural recovery, which shows strong dependence on temperature and the
direction of change. Further investigation of the system suggests that this
behavior can be attributed to restricted mobility of counterions associated
with Laponite particle at the time of temperature change, which do not allow
counterion concentration to reach equilibrium value associated with the changed
temperature. Interestingly this effect is observed to be comparable with other
glassy molecular and soft materials, which while evolve in a self-similar
fashion under isothermal conditions, show asymmetric behavior upon temperature
change.
