9 research outputs found
Observation of Macroscopic Structural Fluctuations in bcc Solid 4He
We report neutron diffraction studies of low density bcc and hcp solid 4He.
In the bcc phase, we observed a continuous dynamical behaviour involving
macroscopic structural changes of the solid. The dynamical behaviour takes
place in a cell full of solid, and therefore represents a solidsolid
transformation. The structural changes are consistent with a gradual rotation
of macroscopic grains separated by low angle grain boundaries. We suggest that
these changes are triggered by random momentary vibrations of the experimental
system. An analysis of Laue diffraction patterns indicates that in some cases
these structural changes, once initiated by a momentary impulse, seem to
proceed at a constant rate over times approaching an hour. The energy
associated with these macroscopic changes appears to be on the order of kT.
Under similar conditions (temperature and pressure), these effects were absent
in the hcp phase.Comment: 14 pages, 6 figure, accepted for PR
Effect of Crystal Quality on HCP-BCC Phase Transition in Solid 4He
The kinetics of HCP-BCC structure phase transition is studied by precise
pressure measurement technique in 4He crystals of different quality. An
anomalous pressure behavior in bad quality crystals under constant volume
conditions is detected just after HCP-BCC structure phase transition. A sharp
pressure drop of 0.2 bar was observed at constant temperature. The subsequent
pressure kinetics is a non-monotonic temperature function. The effect observed
can be explained if we suppose that microscopic liquid droplets appear on the
HCP-BCC interphase region in bad quality crystals. After the interphase region
disappearance, these droplets are crystallized with pressure reduction. It is
shown that this effect is absent in high quality thermal-treated crystals.Comment: 4 pages, 4 figure
Local modes, phonons, and mass transport in solid He
We propose a model to treat the local motion of atoms in solid He as a
local mode. In this model, the solid is assumed to be described by the Self
Consistent Harmonic approximation, combined with an array of local modes. We
show that in the bcc phase the atomic local motion is highly directional and
correlated, while in the hcp phase there is no such correlation. The correlated
motion in the bcc phase leads to a strong hybridization of the local modes with
the T phonon branch, which becomes much softer than that obtained
through a Self Consistent Harmonic calculation, in agreement with experiment.
In addition we predict a high energy excitation branch which is important for
self-diffusion. Both the hybridization and the presence of a high energy branch
are a consequence of the correlation, and appear only in the bcc phase. We
suggest that the local modes can play the role in mass transport usually
attributed to point defects (vacancies). Our approach offers a more overall
consistent picture than obtained using vacancies as the predominant point
defect. In particular, we show that our approach resolves the long standing
controversy regarding the contribution of point defects to the specific heat of
solid He.Comment: 10 pages, 10 figure
Observation of a new excitation in bcc solid 4He by inelastic neutron scattering
We report neutron scattering measurements of the phonons in bcc solid 4He. In
general, only 3 accoustic phonon branches should exist in a monoatomic cubic
crystal. In addition to these phonon branches, we found a new ''optic-like''
mode along the [110] direction. One possible interpretation of this new mode is
in terms of localized excitations unique to a quantum solid.Comment: Text and 4 figures, to appear in Phys. Rev. Let