X-ray Methods for Nanostructure Diagnostics
4 ECTS Credits
The ability to control the particle size and morphology of nanoparticles is of crucial importance
nowadays both from a fundamental and industrial point of view considering the tremendous amount of
high-tech applications of nanostructured metal oxide materials devices such as dye-sensitized solar cells;
displays and smart windows; chemical, gas, and biosensors; lithium batteries; supercapacitors, and so
on. Controlling the crystallographic structure and the arrangement of atoms along the surface of the
nanostructured material will determine most of their physical properties since most of the atoms are on
the surface due to the characteristic very high surface- to-volume ratio of nanostructured materials.
Spectroscopic techniques are traditionally used for investigating the energy distribution of electronic
states (electronic structure), atomic and magnetic structure in atoms, molecules, and solid state
materials.
The lecture course (4 ECTS) “X- ray methods for nanostructure diagnostics” is intended for Master
students as a part of Master program “Nanoscale structure of materials“developed in Southern Federal
University (Rostov-on-Don, Russia).
The goal of the course is to give students the knowledge on some of the X-ray based techniques and to
illustrate how these techniques can be used to study atomic and electronic structure as well as magnetic
properties of different nanomaterials.
Syllabus:
1. High-resolution soft X-ray microscopy for imaging nanoscale magnetic structures and their spin
dynamics.
X-ray optics and soft X-ray microscopy.
Magnetic soft X-ray microscopy.
Static nanoscale magnetic structures.
Spin dynamics in nanoscale magnetic structures.
Future perspectives for magnetic soft X-ray microscopy.
2. Advances in magnetization dynamics using scanning transmission X-ray microscopy.
Magnetism in confined structures.
Magnetic thin film structures of ideally soft materials.
Spin dynamics of the magnetic vortex state.
Experimental setup.
Zone plate.
Radiation damage and choice of detectors.
Time-resolved magnetic imaging.
Contrast mechanism for magnetic imaging.
Experimental setup and data acquisition.
3. Scanning photoelectron microscopy for the characterization of novel nanomaterials.
Photoelectron spectroscopy.
Scanning photoelectron microscopy.
The focusing optics.
The electron energy analyzer.
The sample scanning mechanism.
The application of scanning photoelectron microscopy.
Well-aligned carbon nanorods.
GaN nanowires.
Well-aligned ZnO nanorods.
Determined by the electronic photoelectron microscopy.
4. Coherent X-ray diffraction microscopy.
A brief history of the phase problem.
Scattering of X-rays by homogeneous media.
The first Born approximation.
The first Rytov approximation.
Comparison of CXDM with other X-ray microscopes.
Iterative algorithms.
General formalism.
Experimental design.
Sampling and transverse coherence.
Temporal coherence.
Data acquisition and prereconstruction analysis.
Data assembly.
Image reconstruction.
Image averaging.
Missing data.
Thee-dimensional objects.
Application.
Cell biology.
Material science.
X-ray holography and scanning methods.
5. Many-body interactions in nanoscale matherials by angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy.
ARPES as a probe of many-body interactions in nanostructures.
Thin films.
Two-dimensional states.
Direct observation of many-body interactions.
One-dimensional structures.
Toward nanoARPES – a new tool for nanoscience at synchrotrons.
6. X-ray absorption and emission spectroscopy in the studies of nanomaterials.
Electronic structure of nanostructured naterials.
X-ray absorption spectroscopy.
X-ray emission spectroscopy.
Resonant X-ray emission spectroscopy.
Experimental details.
Undulator beamline.
End-station and fluorescence spectrometer.
Chemical sensitivity of X-ray spectroscopy.
Fullerenes.
Carbon nanotubes.
Nanostructured hematite.
In situ characterization of Co nanoparticles.
Method of assessment: 1 hour written examination – 100%