A temperature-controlled electric field sample environment for small-angle neutron scattering experiments

Dominic W. Hayward; Germinal Magro; Anja Hörmann; Sylvain Prévost; Ralf Schweins; Robert M. Richardson; Michael Gradzielski

doi:10.1063/5.0040675

A temperature-controlled electric field sample environment for small-angle neutron scattering experiments

Dominic W. Hayward^*, Germinal Magro, Anja Hörmann, Sylvain Prévost, Ralf Schweins, Robert M. Richardson, Michael Gradzielski

^*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journal › Article (Academic Journal) › peer-review

5 Citations (Scopus)

Abstract

A new sample environment is introduced for the study of soft matter samples in electric fieldsusing small-angle neutron scattering instruments. The sample environment is temperature controlled and features external electrodes, allowing standard quartz cuvettes to be used and conducting samples or samples containing ions to be investigated without the risk of electrochemical reactions occurring at the electrodes. For standard 12.5 mm quartz cuvettes, the maximum applied field is 8 kV/cm, and the applied field may be static or alternating (up to 10 kHz for 8 kV/cm and up to 60 kHz for4 kV/cm). The electric fields within the sample are calculated and simulated under a number of different conditions, and the capabilities of the setup are demonstrated using a variety of liquid crystalline samples. Measurements were performed as a function of temperature and time spent in the electric field. Finally, the advantages, drawbacks, and potential optimization of the sample environment are discussed with reference to applications in the fields of complex soft matter, biology, and electrorheology.

Original language	English
Article number	033903
Journal	Review of Scientific Instruments
Volume	92
Issue number	3
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1063/5.0040675
Publication status	Published - 1 Mar 2021

Bibliographical note

Funding Information:
This work was funded by the BMBF (Grant No. 05K16KT1). Experiments at the ISIS Neutron and Muon Source were supported by a beamtime allocation No. RB1520013 from the Science and Technology Facilities Council. The authors gratefully acknowledge Herbert Zimmerman for providing us with the perdeuterated liquid crystal and the ILL Instrument Control Service for their support before and during the experiment and thank Frédéric Thomas at the ILL for running the FEA simulations featured in this work. D.W.H. also thanks the Partnership for Soft Condensed Matter (PSCM) and, particularly, Peter van der Linden, Diego Pontoni, and Yuri Gerelli for their helpful advice and use of the rapid prototyping facility. This work benefited from the use of the SasView application, originally developed under NSF Award No. DMR-0520547. SasView contains the code developed with funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under the SINE2020 project (Grant Agreement No. 654000).

Publisher Copyright:
© 2021 Author(s).

Access to Document

10.1063/5.0040675Licence: CC BY

Handle.net

Persistent link

Cite this

@article{798e208e7989489184dcb1880856968c,

title = "A temperature-controlled electric field sample environment for small-angle neutron scattering experiments",

abstract = "A new sample environment is introduced for the study of soft matter samples in electric fieldsusing small-angle neutron scattering instruments. The sample environment is temperature controlled and features external electrodes, allowing standard quartz cuvettes to be used and conducting samples or samples containing ions to be investigated without the risk of electrochemical reactions occurring at the electrodes. For standard 12.5 mm quartz cuvettes, the maximum applied field is 8 kV/cm, and the applied field may be static or alternating (up to 10 kHz for 8 kV/cm and up to 60 kHz for4 kV/cm). The electric fields within the sample are calculated and simulated under a number of different conditions, and the capabilities of the setup are demonstrated using a variety of liquid crystalline samples. Measurements were performed as a function of temperature and time spent in the electric field. Finally, the advantages, drawbacks, and potential optimization of the sample environment are discussed with reference to applications in the fields of complex soft matter, biology, and electrorheology. ",

author = "Hayward, {Dominic W.} and Germinal Magro and Anja H{\"o}rmann and Sylvain Pr{\'e}vost and Ralf Schweins and Richardson, {Robert M.} and Michael Gradzielski",

note = "Funding Information: This work was funded by the BMBF (Grant No. 05K16KT1). Experiments at the ISIS Neutron and Muon Source were supported by a beamtime allocation No. RB1520013 from the Science and Technology Facilities Council. The authors gratefully acknowledge Herbert Zimmerman for providing us with the perdeuterated liquid crystal and the ILL Instrument Control Service for their support before and during the experiment and thank Fr{\'e}d{\'e}ric Thomas at the ILL for running the FEA simulations featured in this work. D.W.H. also thanks the Partnership for Soft Condensed Matter (PSCM) and, particularly, Peter van der Linden, Diego Pontoni, and Yuri Gerelli for their helpful advice and use of the rapid prototyping facility. This work benefited from the use of the SasView application, originally developed under NSF Award No. DMR-0520547. SasView contains the code developed with funding from the European Union{\textquoteright}s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under the SINE2020 project (Grant Agreement No. 654000). Publisher Copyright: {\textcopyright} 2021 Author(s).",

year = "2021",

month = mar,

day = "1",

doi = "10.1063/5.0040675",

language = "English",

volume = "92",

journal = "Review of Scientific Instruments",

issn = "0034-6748",

publisher = "American Institute of Physics (AIP)",

number = "3",

}

TY - JOUR

T1 - A temperature-controlled electric field sample environment for small-angle neutron scattering experiments

AU - Hayward, Dominic W.

AU - Magro, Germinal

AU - Hörmann, Anja

AU - Prévost, Sylvain

AU - Schweins, Ralf

AU - Richardson, Robert M.

AU - Gradzielski, Michael

N1 - Funding Information: This work was funded by the BMBF (Grant No. 05K16KT1). Experiments at the ISIS Neutron and Muon Source were supported by a beamtime allocation No. RB1520013 from the Science and Technology Facilities Council. The authors gratefully acknowledge Herbert Zimmerman for providing us with the perdeuterated liquid crystal and the ILL Instrument Control Service for their support before and during the experiment and thank Frédéric Thomas at the ILL for running the FEA simulations featured in this work. D.W.H. also thanks the Partnership for Soft Condensed Matter (PSCM) and, particularly, Peter van der Linden, Diego Pontoni, and Yuri Gerelli for their helpful advice and use of the rapid prototyping facility. This work benefited from the use of the SasView application, originally developed under NSF Award No. DMR-0520547. SasView contains the code developed with funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under the SINE2020 project (Grant Agreement No. 654000). Publisher Copyright: © 2021 Author(s).

PY - 2021/3/1

Y1 - 2021/3/1

N2 - A new sample environment is introduced for the study of soft matter samples in electric fieldsusing small-angle neutron scattering instruments. The sample environment is temperature controlled and features external electrodes, allowing standard quartz cuvettes to be used and conducting samples or samples containing ions to be investigated without the risk of electrochemical reactions occurring at the electrodes. For standard 12.5 mm quartz cuvettes, the maximum applied field is 8 kV/cm, and the applied field may be static or alternating (up to 10 kHz for 8 kV/cm and up to 60 kHz for4 kV/cm). The electric fields within the sample are calculated and simulated under a number of different conditions, and the capabilities of the setup are demonstrated using a variety of liquid crystalline samples. Measurements were performed as a function of temperature and time spent in the electric field. Finally, the advantages, drawbacks, and potential optimization of the sample environment are discussed with reference to applications in the fields of complex soft matter, biology, and electrorheology.

AB - A new sample environment is introduced for the study of soft matter samples in electric fieldsusing small-angle neutron scattering instruments. The sample environment is temperature controlled and features external electrodes, allowing standard quartz cuvettes to be used and conducting samples or samples containing ions to be investigated without the risk of electrochemical reactions occurring at the electrodes. For standard 12.5 mm quartz cuvettes, the maximum applied field is 8 kV/cm, and the applied field may be static or alternating (up to 10 kHz for 8 kV/cm and up to 60 kHz for4 kV/cm). The electric fields within the sample are calculated and simulated under a number of different conditions, and the capabilities of the setup are demonstrated using a variety of liquid crystalline samples. Measurements were performed as a function of temperature and time spent in the electric field. Finally, the advantages, drawbacks, and potential optimization of the sample environment are discussed with reference to applications in the fields of complex soft matter, biology, and electrorheology.

UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85102235292&partnerID=8YFLogxK

U2 - 10.1063/5.0040675

DO - 10.1063/5.0040675

M3 - Article (Academic Journal)

C2 - 33820030

AN - SCOPUS:85102235292

SN - 0034-6748

VL - 92

JO - Review of Scientific Instruments

JF - Review of Scientific Instruments

IS - 3

M1 - 033903

ER -

A temperature-controlled electric field sample environment for small-angle neutron scattering experiments

Abstract

Bibliographical note

Access to Document

Handle.net

Other files and links

Fingerprint

Cite this