ANSTO's research capabilities, led by the OPAL nuclear research reactor and associated instruments provide access to users investigating areas as diverse as materials, life sciences, climate change and mining/engineering.
Applications
Modern applications of cold-neutron triple-axis spectroscopy essentially focus to achieve a basic understanding of how materials respond to a change in temperature, or to an applied magnetic field.
Examples of basic scientific interest are systems which undergo a 'quantum-phase transition' at extremely low temperatures. Such phenomena are observed in some magnetic compounds when a magnetic field (instead of temperature) is used to induce a transition to a new phase.
Examples of technological importance are 'functional' materials, exhibiting a predetermined response to external stimuli. The ferromagnetic alloy Ni2MnGa is a material which, through a shape deformation in a magnetic field, is used as a magnetic-field driven actuator. Experimental data for excitation energies, for the deformed state in a field of 1 Tesla, can be compared with ab-initio calculations for this system. Such a comparison provides a crucial check if the underlying physics for the system's 'function' is correctly described.
Of special interest for technical applications is 'high-temperature superconductivity', ie. certain materials exhibit electrical conductivity with zero resistance at cooling temperatures which are higher (and therefore easier accessible) than those needed for hitherto commercially used superconducting materials. An external magnetic field tends to suppress superconductivity with effects to be explained by any theory of the underlying mechanism.