Professor Justin Wark

Abstract:

Over the past few years we have been pioneering the use of sub-nanosecond X-ray diffraction to determine the phase and compression of shocked crystals. It is well known that the deviation of atoms from their ideal lattice sites due to thermal motion reduces the integrated intensity within diffraction peaks - the so-called Debye-Waller effect, and thus it is pertinent to investigate whether line ratios might be sufficiently sensitive to be used as a viable temperature diagnostic. Clearly the matter is not completely straight-forward, as the Debye frequency of a solid also varies under compression. In our initial investigations we have calculated the ratios of intensities of high-order reflections assuming various forms of the Gruneisen parameter, and have also compared these results with those obtained from Molecular Dynamics simulations. Given the photon energies of nanosecond X-ray pulses that can currently be produced, we comment on the experimental feasibility of the technique.

Abstract:

In situ diffraction is a technique to probe directly the lattice response of materials during the shock loading process. It is used to record diffraction patterns from multiple lattice planes simultaneously. The application of this technique is described for laser-based shock experiments. The approach to analyze in situ wide-angle diffraction data is discussed. This is presented in the context of single crystal [001] iron shock experiments where uniaxial compression of the bee lattice by up to 6% was observed. Above the alpha-epsilon transition pressure, the lattice showed a collapse along the [001] direction by 15-18%. Additional diffraction lines appear that confirm the transformation of the iron crystal from the initial bee phase to the hcp phase. (C) 2006 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Abstract:

The past few years have seen a rapid growth in the development and exploitation of X-ray diffraction on ultrafast time-scales. One area of physics which has benefited particularly from these advances is the the field of shock-waves. Whilst it has been known for many years that crystalline matter, subjected to uniaxial shock compression, can undergo plastic deformation and, for certain materials, polymorphic phase transformations, it has hitherto not been possible to observe the rearrangement of the atoms on the pertinent timescales. We have used laser-plasma generated X-rays to study how single crystals of metals (copper and iron) react to uniaxial shock compression, and observed rapid plastic flow (in the case of copper), and directly observed the famous alpha-epsilon transition in Iron. These studies have been complemented by large-scale multi-million atom molecular dynamics simulations, yielding significant information on the underlying physics.