Techniques for neutron diffraction on solidified gases to 10 GPa and above: Applications to ND3 phase IV

Abstract

Neutron powder diffraction can provide important structural information on hydrogenous compounds which are gases at ambient temperature. For high pressure studies, however, this technique has been seriously limited by the fact that it was impossible (a) to load such gases in large volume devices and (b) to compress them to elevated pressures above some 1 GPa. In this letter we show that, using a previously described pressure cell, a wide range of gaseous samples may be loaded and compressed to ∼10 GPa with standard tungsten carbide anvils. We illustrate the effectiveness of the technique with neutron powder diffraction data recently collected on deuterated ammonia ND3 phase IV, where accurate structural data were obtained after a few hours collection time.