Training Course on ZEBRA
Duration: 1 day
Sodiumnitroprusside (Na2(Fe{(CN)5NO]} 2H2O, SNP) is a material which is changing its structural properties when illuminated with light at low temperature. This has been demonstrated by neutron diffraction investigations. Neutron diffraction is interesting as N and O have different scattering lengths for neutrons. This is especially interesting as the electron configuration is not changed significantly, making X-ray diffraction much less sensitive.
We measure in this practicum the ground state structure of the molecule using the single crystal neutron diffractometer ZEBRA. You will learn to perform a single crystal diffraction instrument and to analyse the data.
You will align the SNP crystal, determine the so called UB-matrix as desribed below and measure an overnight data-set at room temperature. During the measurment,you have the possibility to analyse an old data-set measured at 90K, using JANA2006, an advanced program package shown in the supplementary section.
Background information on the scientific case is presented in a paper of Prof. D. Schaniel, describing the structural change (NO-inversion) between the metastable state (called MS1) and the ground state (called GS, and what we are investigating in this internship).
Supplementary Material:
Last revision : April 20, 2013 by O. Zaharko, mailto:oksana.zaharko@psi.ch