Structural covariance in the hard sphere fluid.

We study the joint variability of structural information in a hard sphere fluid biased to avoid crystallisation and form five-fold symmetric geometric motifs. We show that the structural covariance matrix approach, originally proposed for on-lattice liquids [P. Ronceray and P. Harrowell, J. Stat. Mech.: Theory Exp. 2016(8), 084002], can be meaningfully employed to understand structural relationships between different motifs and can predict, within the linear-response regime, structural changes related to motifs distinct from that used to bias the system.