High Contrast X-ray Speckle from Atomic-Scale Order in Liquids and Glasses

S. O. Hruszkewycz, M. Sutton, P. H. Fuoss, B. Adams, S. Rosenkranz, K. F. Ludwig, Jr., W. Roseker, D. Fritz, M. Cammarata, D. Zhu, S. Lee, H. Lemke, C. Gutt, A. Robert, G. Grübel, and G. B. Stephenson

Phys. Rev. Lett. 109, 185502 – Published 2 November 2012

Abstract

The availability of ultrafast pulses of coherent hard x rays from the Linac Coherent Light Source opens new opportunities for studies of atomic-scale dynamics in amorphous materials. Here, we show that single ultrafast coherent x-ray pulses can be used to observe the speckle contrast in the high-angle diffraction from liquid Ga and glassy ${Ni}_{2} {Pd}_{2} P$ and $B_{2} O_{3}$ . We determine the thresholds above which the x-ray pulses disturb the atomic arrangements. Furthermore, high contrast speckle is observed in scattering patterns from the glasses integrated over many pulses, demonstrating that the source and optics are sufficiently stable for x-ray photon correlation spectroscopy studies of dynamics over a wide range of time scales.

Received 14 February 2012

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevLett.109.185502

Authors & Affiliations

S. O. Hruszkewycz¹, M. Sutton², P. H. Fuoss¹, B. Adams³, S. Rosenkranz¹, K. F. Ludwig, Jr.⁴, W. Roseker⁵, D. Fritz⁶, M. Cammarata⁶, D. Zhu⁶, S. Lee^5,6,*, H. Lemke⁶, C. Gutt⁵, A. Robert⁶, G. Grübel⁵, and G. B. Stephenson^1,7

¹Materials Science Division, Argonne National Laboratory, Argonne, Illinois 60439, USA
²Department of Physics, McGill University, Montreal, Québec H3A2T8, Canada
³X-ray Science Division, Argonne National Laboratory, Argonne, Illinois 60439, USA
⁴Department of Physics, Boston University, Boston, Massachusetts 02215, USA
⁵HASYLAB, Deutsches Elektronen-Synchrotron, Notkestraβe 85, D-22607 Hamburg, Germany
⁶Linac Coherent Light Source, SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory, Menlo Park, California 94025, USA
⁷Advanced Photon Source, Argonne National Laboratory, Argonne, Illinois 60439, USA