CPM Seminar

Analysis of thermal diffuse scattering of x-rays (TDS) has recently shown great promise as a tool for phonon studies in complex materials, complementing more traditional neutron scattering techniques. Quasi-elastic x-ray scattering from thermally populated phonon modes has been used to study lattice dynamics and phonon phase transitions in several systems. Recent experiments are reviewed - the viability and accuracy of this method was established by studying elemental systems including Si, Nb, and delta phase Pu while the applicability to more complex materials was demonstrated by studying phonon softening in charge density wave (CDW) TiSe₂ and antiferrodistortive (AFD) SrTiO₃. Time permitting, future experiments in correlated lattice/electron systems of interest such as high temperature superconductivity (HTCS) and colossal magnetoresistive (CMR) materials will be discussed.

Thursday, October 3rd 2002, 15:30
Ernest Rutherford Physics Building, room 114