The Canadian Institute for Neutron Scattering held the tenth Neutron Summer School at Chalk River on June 15-19, 2009. The talks and demonstration experiments was organized by the Canadian Neutron Beam Centre.
Format
The aim of the school is to cover a wide range of topics associated with thermal neutron scattering, including powder diffraction, stress analysis, texture, reflectometry, magnetism and neutron scattering, SANS, inelastic scattering together with the underlying theory associated with neutron scattering. Lectures will be held in the mornings. A variety of demonstration practical experiments on the neutron instruments will be held in the afternoons, from which the attendees will be able to select four hands-on practicals at the reactor with the neutron instruments. The aim of the school is to give a broad overview of neutron methods and applications, concentrating on those techniques available at a thermal neutron source.
Target Audience
The lectures are aimed at beginning graduate students who have a wide variety of backgrounds in the sciences, such as physics, chemistry, materials science, structural biology, mineralogy. Therefore, graduate students, postdocs, faculty and industrial scientists should profit from attending the school. The theory will be presented in a way that should be understood by people in any of these fields.
Program
The agenda for the week will cover the general concepts of neutron scattering and introduce several specific techniques and areas of application. There will be a strong emphasis on demonstration neutron scattering experiments, conducted at the NRU research reactor at Chalk River.
Lectures
Monday
1. Neutrons 101: Properties of Neutrons – Ian Swainson
2. Basic theory I: elastic neutron scattering (handout) – Zahra Yamani
3. Texture, Strain and Stress – Michael Gharghouri
Tuesday
1. Neutron Powder Diffraction – Mario Bieringer
2. Basic theory II: inelastic neutron scattering – Zahra Yamani
3. SANS: Small Angle Neutron Scattering – Mu-Ping Nieh
Wednesday
1. Neutron powder diffraction studies of magnetic materials –Dominic Ryan
2. Triple-axis spectrometry – Maikel Rheinstaedter
3. Neutron Reflectometry – Helmut Fritzsche
Thursday
1. Neutron Scattering from Biologically-relevant Materials – John Katsaras
2. Solving Tough Quantum Materials Problems with Neutron Scattering – Bruce Gaulin
3. Application of Neutron Scattering to Materials Issues – a Case Study – Rick Holt
Experiments
The summer school aims to cover the breadth of neutron scattering techniques using thermal neutrons. Each afternoon, Monday-Thursday, demonstration experiments will be available to summer school particpants at the NRU reactor. Experiments planned include:
- magnetic neutron scattering and inelastic scattering
- powder diffraction
- stress measurement of engineering materials
- reflectometry
- measurements on biologically-relevant material.
On Sunday evening there will be a free barbecue at the registration at Ogilvies Cottages for all the attendees of the summer school.
Pictures from the 2006 Summer School
2006 Summer School at Chalk River.
