No Arabic abstract
Inelastic x-ray scattering (IXS) measurements of the dynamic structure factor in liquid Na57K43, sensitive to the atomic-scale coarse graining, reveal a sound velocity value exceeding the long wavelength, continuum value and indicate the coexistence of two phonon-like modes. Applying Generalized Collective Mode (GCM) analysis scheme, we show that the positive dispersion of the sound velocity occurs in a wavelength region below the crossover from hydrodynamic to atom-type excitations and, therefore, it can not be explained as sound propagation over the light specie (Na) network. The present result experimentally proves the existence of positive dispersion in a binary mixture due to a relaxation process, as opposed to fast sound phenomena.
Surface sensitive x-ray scattering techniques with atomic scale resolution are employed to investigate the microscopic structure of the surface of three classes of liquid binary alloys: (i) Surface segregation in partly miscible binary alloys as predicted by the Gibbs adsorption rule is investigated for Ga-In. The first layer consists of a supercooled In monolayer and the bulk composition is reached after about two atomic diameters. (ii) The Ga-Bi system displays a wetting transition at a characteristic temperature T_w~220 C. The transition from a Bi monolayer on Ga below T_w to a thick Bi-rich wetting film above T_w is studied. (iii) The effect of attractive interactions between the two components of a binary alloy on the surface structure is investigated for two Hg-Au alloys.
Measurements of the surface x-ray scattering from several pure liquid metals (Hg, Ga, and In) and from three alloys (Ga-Bi, Bi-In, and K-Na) with different heteroatomic chemical interactions in the bulk phase are reviewed. Surface-induced layering is found for each elemental liquid metal. The surface structure of the K-Na alloy resembles that of an elemental liquid metal. Bi-In displays pair formation at the surface. Surface segregation and a wetting film are found for Ga-Bi.
We show, that the theoretical expression for the dispersion of collective excitations reported in [Phys. Rev. B {bf 103}, 099901 (2021)], at variance with what was claimed in the paper, does not account for the energy fluctuations and does not tend in the long-wavelegth limit to the correct hydrodynamic dispersion law.
We show that the presented in Phys.Rev.B, v.101, 214312 (2020) theoretical expressions for longitudinal current spectral function $C^L(k,omega)$ and dispersion of collective excitations are not correct. Indeed, they are not compatible with the continuum limit and $C^L(k,omegato 0)$ contradicts the continuity equation.
Tunnelling Two-Level Systems (TLS) dominate the physics of glasses at low temperatures. Yet TLS are extremely rare and it is extremely difficult to directly observe them $it{in , silico}$. It is thus crucial to develop simple structural predictors that can provide markers for determining if a TLS is present in a given glass region. It has been speculated that Quasi-Localized vibrational Modes (QLM) are closely related to TLS, and that one can extract information about TLS from QLM. In this work we address this possibility. In particular, we investigate the degree to which a linear or non-linear vibrational mode analysis can predict the location of TLS independently found by energy landscape exploration. We find that even though there is a notable spatial correlation between QLM and TLS, in general TLS are strongly non-linear and their global properties cannot be predicted by a simple normal mode analysis.