Head of Department: Doctor of Sciences Mikhail A. STRZHEMECHNY
tel: +(380)-57-341-09-65
fax: +(380)-57-340-33-70
E-mail: strzhemechny@ilt.kharkov.ua
The Department was organized in 1990 by amalgamating the former Laboratory of Structure-Sensitive Properties of Solids and the Single-crystal x-ray Group from the Biophysics Department. The old Laboratory was headed by L. M. Polyakov (from 1962 till 1964), D. N. Bolshutkin (from 1965 till 1970), I. N. Krupskii (from 1970 till 1986), M. A. Strzhemechny (from 1986 till 1988), and A. I. Erenburg (from 1988 till 1990).
At the beginning the laboratory was mainly involved in studies of the plastic and strength properties of the cryocrystals, i.e. the solids with low melting points, and other materials, whose samples need to be prepared in situ. Gradually the main interests shifted to cover other solid state physics topics, such as the structure and the lattice dynamics of the above-quoted materials.
At present, 9 scientific staff members and 4 post graduate students work at the Department, among them two Doctors of Sciences (M. A. Strzhemechny and A. I. Prokhvatilov) and 4 Candidates of Sciences (Ph.D.): L.A. Alekseeva, N. V. Krainyukova, A. A. Solodovnik and Yu. E. Stetsenko.
Main scientific fields:
- structure of solids over a wide temperature range from liquid
helium to room temperature using x-ray and electron diffraction;
- lattice dynamics of molecular crystals with account of internal
degrees of freedom;
- phase transitions in solids;
- plasticity of cryocrystals, mainly of the hydrogens.
Materials investigated:
Cryocrytals, i.e. materials with low melting points, such as rare
gas solids, hydrogen, nitrogen, carbon oxide and monoxide, nitrous
oxide, methane, as well as binary alloys thereof; fullerenes;
magnetically ordered materials, molecular solids such as guanine, various
phenones, etc.
The most important results obtained in this Department are:
- the extensive structure studies of the various molecular
cryocrystals and the orientational order therein, summarized in books:
1. Cryocrystals (eds. B. I. Verkin and A. F. Prikhot'ko)
Naukova Dumka, Kiev (1983) - in Russian.
2. Physics of Cryocrystals (eds. Yu. A. Freiman, V. G. Manzhelii,
M. L. Klein, and A. A. Maradudin) AIP Publishers, New York (1996).
3. V.G.Manzhelii, A.I.Prokhvatilov, I.Ya. Minchina, and L.D.
Yantsevich. Handbook of Binary Solutions, Begell House Inc., New York
- Wallinford (1996).
4. V.G.Manzhelii,A.I.Prokhvatilov, V.G.Gavrilko, A.P.Isakina.
Handbook of Structure and Thermodynamic Properties of Cryocrystals.
Begell House Inc., New York (1997), Wallinford (UK).
- the first results on the plasticity characteristics of many
cryocrystals, including the quantum crystal of hydrogen.
- determination of the structure of many molecular solids such as caffeine, adenine, theofiline, and other.
- x-ray and electron diffraction studies of the structure of
various cryoalloy systems such as the solid mixtures of simplest
molecular components (nitrogen, carbon dioxide and monoxide, methanes,
etc.) and rare gases with an eye for studying the molecular glass aspects.
The Department has to its credit many original experimental setups
and the respective measurement procedures, originally developed and
successfully run for years, among which are:
- liquid-helium powder x-ray cryostat operating from 2 K to room
temperature;
- liquid-helium cryostat for electron diffraction studies from 2
K to room temperature;
- special cryostat assembly for unique low-temperature (5 K and
higher) RHEED measurements.