Correlated atomic motions in liquid deuterium fluoride studied by coherent quasielastic neutron scattering

8 pags., 7 figs.,The collective dynamics of liquid deuterium fluoride are studied by means of high-resolution quasielastic and inelastic neutron scattering over a range of four decades in energy transfer. The spectra show a low-energy coherent quasielastic component which arises from correlated stochastic motions as well as a broad inelastic feature originating from overdamped density oscillations. While these results are at variance with previous works which report on the presence of propagating collective modes, they are fully consistent with neutron diffraction, nuclear magnetic resonance, and infrared/Raman experiments on this prototypical hydrogen-bonded fluid. © 2007 American Institute of Physics.The authors thank M. J. Dickson, A. J. Church, and C. M. Goodway from the ISIS User Support Group for their assistance with sample preparation. F.F.-A. gratefully acknowledges financial support from the UK Science and Technology Facilities Council. S.E.M. thanks the U.S. National Science Foundation NSF for fellowship monies under Award No. OISE-0404938. J.F.C.T. acknowledges the financial support of the U.S. NSF through a CAREER award Grant No. CHE-0349010