Abstract
Diffuse scattering studies of structural phase transitions in electronically low-dimensional metals provide a clue to understand properties of the low-dimensional electron system because the structural change is brought about by instabilities of the electron system. A brief explanation is given for the mechanism of possible structural changes ; a charge-density wave formation, the Peierls transition, and the spin-Peierls transition. Examples are shown of experimental results obtained by X-ray diffuse scattering in several materials undergoing each kind of phase transitions.
