Contents


Preface

Rather than providing a comprehensive overview of scientific opportunities offered by this field of research, this book aims to give the reader a taste of a few novel applications of two complementary scattering methods: high-resolution Inelastic X-ray Scattering (IXS) and Powder Diffraction (XPD), respectively characterizing dynamic (time-dependent) and static (structural) properties of materials at

In a scattering measurement, a beam of particles-waves impinges on a sample at thermal equilibrium exchanging with it both **energy** and **momentum**, and being, as a result, scattered in all directions. If the perturbation induced on the target sample

Conceptually, a scattering instrument resembles a microscope pointed on either the structure or the dynamics of the target sample. Indeed, it can be zoomed in or out to focus on various distances and time-lapses by a suitable variation of momentum and

decreasing the incident beam wavelength, the use of short wavelength radiation, as X-rays, can shed light phenomena occurring over extremely short distances and

It is customary to distinguish between diffraction and inelastic scattering methods: the first elucidates static properties of materials through the scanning of the

exchanged momentum, while the second offers the additional option of varying the

As mentioned, this book mainly deals with two specific examples of inelastic scattering and a diffraction technique (IXS and XPD) and its chapters are organized as

is weak, the dependence of the scattered beam intensity on the energy and momentum exchanged is uniquely informative of equilibrium properties of the sample. When the beam's particles involved are X-rays, such a scattering intensity ultimately conveys information on the positions and the movements of the target

energy transfers, respectively. Since the latter variables both increase upon

frequency, as required to investigate dynamic phenomena.

The characterization of microscopic properties of materials over distances comparable with, or smaller than, the nearest atoms'separations and time-lapses roughly matching "in-shell" rattling periods has become of critical relevance in our society and has been the focus of intensive research, having both fundamental and applicative aspects. From the experimental side, a relevant portion of these studies is routinely carried out using large-scale X-ray of neutron facilities research and relies on the use of sources, as well as more conventional X-ray

instrumentation.

mesoscopic scales.

sample's molecules.

timescales.

follows.
