Neutron-scattering study of metallic sodium


H. Abe, K. Ohshima, T. Suzuki and S. Hoshino
Institute of Applied Physics, University of Tsukuba, Tukuba 305, Japan

K. Kakurai
Institute for Solid State Physics, University of Tokyo, Roppongi, Minatoku, Tokyo 106, Japan

Phys. Rev. B49, 3739 (1994).


A neutron elastic- and inelastic-scattering study has been performed on single crystals of metallic sodium over a temperature range of 10 to 300 K. On cooling the virgin sample, the incubation time to transform from the bcc structure to the low-temperature structure was found to be more than 2 h at 38 K. The full width at half maximum (FWHM) of the (110)bcc Bragg reflection suddenly increased from 0.3 to 0.73 degrees, due to some deformation introduced by the nucleation of the low-temperature structure. In relation to the deformation, stron extra-diffuse scattering was observed around the (110)bcc Bragg reflection in addition to thermal diffuse scattering. On warming though the transformation, the FWHM gradually recovered but was larger than that of the virgin state. Apparently some deformation still remained in the bcc structure even though the low-temperature structure disappeared. It was estimated that the cluster size of the low-temperature phase is more than 3.2 nm along the c axis from analzing the Huang-type diffuse scattering. On cooling again, the phase transition did not take place untill 10 K and a waiting time of at least 20min at that temperature was needed before the transformation took place. No drastic change in the TA1[110] phonon-dispersion branch downto 38 K was observed, though the phonon energies for q > 0.25 decreased slightly with decreasing temperature.

FIG.1
Phonon-dispersion curve of the TA1[110] branch at 200K () and 38K().
FIG.2
Relative phonon energy shifts DeltaE/E vs temperature for phonons of the TA1[110] branch.
FIG.3
Schematic drawing of the temperature cycle.
FIG.4
FWHM of the (110)bcc Bragg reflection vs time at 38 K.
FIG.5
Equi-intensity distribution in the (hk0) reciprocal-lattice plane including (110)bcc and (009)9R Bragg reflections.
FIG.6
Temperature dependence of FWHM for the (110)bcc Bragg reflection. () First temperature cycle (200->38->90 K) and () second temperature cycle(90->10->200K).
FIG.9
Intensity distribution of Huang-type diffuse scattering IHDS at 38 K on (hk0) plane. Central circle means two-dimensional distribution at half maximum of the intensity for the (110)bcc Bragg reflection. The line is shown for reference in Fig.10.
FIG.10
Intensity IHDS vs reduced wave vactor z=qa0/sqrt(2)pi at (110)bcc along the [110] direction, where a0 is the lattice parameter of the bcc structure. The line measured is depicted in Fig.9.
FIG.11
Intensity distribution calculated by Eq.(1) in the text on the (hk0) plane. Compare it with Fig.9.

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ab@nda.ac.jp
Department of Materials Science and Engineering
National Defense Academy

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