Novel Atomic Imaging Method for Materials with Light Elements Dopants―White Neutron Holography

Abstract

Since in most of functional materials or strongly correlated electron systems, the properties can be controlled by foreign elements doping. Thus, to understand the doping effects, atomic imaging around the dopant must be indispensable. White neutron holography, which was developed by the authors, is a novel probe for atomic imaging of light elements around a dopant in materials. Using this method, the authors group have succeeded in visualizing local atomic images around dopants in B doped Si, B doped Mg₂X (X: Si, Sn), Sm doped RB₆(R: Yb, La) and so on. The authors believe that white neutron holography in J-PARC will be a novel and important probe for materials science.