The Materials Characterisation Laboratory has chosen to focus on the science highlights, showing some of the support the MCL gives to beamline experiments directly.
Contents:
General updates
Staffing Changes
There have been some staff changes at the MCL since the last edition of the newsletter.
Leavers
The MCL wishes to bid a fond farewell to the industrial placement student Poppy McPeake after a year in the lab. Poppy has been method developing the FMR (FerroMagnetic Resonance) rig in the materials characterisation lab, continuing from previous IP students and advancing the project further, including a new cavity giving access to new frequency ranges writing LabVIEW code to control the power sensor. Poppy has also been involved in a beamline experiment on POLREF. In addition, she has also become a valuable member of the ISIS EDI working group. We wish Poppy good luck with the rest of her degree, and beyond!
New Starters
The MCL wishes to welcome our new industrial placement student, Hannah Alexander, to the team! Hannah's first day was on the 21st of August. Her project will involve further method development of the FMR rig and method development of calibrations of the x-ray instrumentation.
New Industrial Placement Student Position
The MCL has been successful in its application for an Industrial Placement Student for the 2024-2025 period. The role is based in the MCL, and involves practical method development of instruments, stages and techniques within the lab, such as the FMR rig and the in-situ reactive gas furnace x-ray diffraction sample environment. The advert is currently live
here, and will close on the 29th of October.
Science Highlights
WISH
γ-BaFe2O4: a fresh playground for room temperature multiferroicity
γ-BaFe2O4 is a previously unrecognised multiferroic material, showing multiferroic properties even at room temperature. Magnetic and electrical polarisation measurements at varying temperature are explored in this Nature Communications paper. The MCL provided the facility and training to conduct high temperaure magnetometry measurements, using the MPMS3 SQUID instrument with the furnace attachment as complimentary data to the variable temperature data collected from the WISH neutron beamtime.
WISH, HRPD
One-dimensional quantum magnetism in the S = 1/2 Mo(V) system KMoOP2O7
In this paper covering a comprehensive
ab initio and experimental study of the S = 1/2 Mo5+ system, KMoOP2O7, the MCL was able to provide the facilities and expertise for measurements. One set of measurements was magnetic susceptibility (using the MPMS3 SQUID), finding no difference between zero-field-cooled and field-cooled results. The other was specific-heat measurements (using the PPMS), including the use of the dilution fridge insert, to allow both the 1.8 - 300 K range and the 0.1 - 4 K ranges to be probed. These measurements on the samples are complimentary to the data obtained from the neutron beamtime measurements on HRPD, WISH and at the ILL.
HRPD
Partitioning the Two-Leg Spin Ladder in Ba2Cu1 − xZnxTeO6: From Magnetic Order through Spin-Freezing to Paramagnetism
Ba2CuTeO6 has a two-leg spin ladder of Cu2+ cations near to a quantum critical point, which makes it an interesting material for study. In this paper, the substitution of non-magnetic Zn impurities in the Cu positions is investigated through thermodynamical means and magnetic means, and a point at which it became spin-frozen was found. Instruments in the MCL were used, for example, the Miniflex was used to monitor the sample purity during the reaction, prepared for the neutron experiment.
POLREF
This paper reports an investigation into FePt/FeRh thin films with respect to temperature-dependent exchange coupling and depth sensitivity, utilising PNR and XRD and bulk magnetometry. A Rigaku SmartLab XRD instrument was used to confirm the crystalinity of the samples and to measure the reflectivity of the samples to determine the layer structure and thickness prior to neutron experiments. This also allowed the researchers to determine the characteristic length scales for which the exchange-spring mechanism was effective with respect to temperature.
For more details on the Materials Characterisation Lab, please
contact the MCL Lab Manager, Dr Gavin Stenning and check out the Materials Characterisation Lab
website.
