Antiferromagnetic, Secret Magnetism
By observing changes in coherent X-ray speckle pattern, researchers can investigate nanoscale dynamics of antiferromagnetic domain walls and observe a cross over from classical to quantum behavior. Unlike conventional magnets, antiferromagnets are materials that exhibit "secret" magnetism that is not easily detectable. Instead, their magnetism is confined to very small regions where atoms behave as tiny magnets by spontaneously aligning themselves oppositely to adjacent atoms thus neutralising the overall magnetism of the material. Antiferromagnets remained a mystery because their internal structure is far too fine to be measured using techniques ultimately relying on visual inspection. The internal order of antiferromagnets is on the same scale as the wavelength of X-rays, below 10 nanometers, and these have now been used to produce a "speckle" pattern which is actually a hologram, a unique fingerprint of a particular magnetic domain configuration. In addition to producing the first holograms of an antiferromagnet, the research revealed that the holograms are actually time-dependent, even down to the lowest temperatures.
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Keywords: -ray, anl, anti-ferromagnets, antiferromagnetic, antiferromagnets, argonne, atomic, atoms, ferromagnets, hologram, laboratory, magnetism, national, pattern, physics, quantum, research, science, secret, speckle
