WE-Heraeus-Seminar: Bridging Length Scales in Magnetism – Diffuse Scattering from the Atomic to the Mesoscale

This WE-Heraeus seminar focuses on the technique of magnetic small-angle neutron scattering(SANS) and its extension towards a unified description of diffuse scattering from the atomic to the mesoscale. Magnetic SANS is well established to elucidate the magnetic structure of a wealth of different systems as diverse as from nanotextured materials all the way to emergent spin textures of strongly correlated electron systems and superconductors. An equally rich group of material classes is also characterized by the absence of long-range magnetic order and – in turn – by their diffuse scattering signature, however, on an atomic length scale. Their magnetic structure is typically characterized by disorder introduced by frustrated or competing magnetic interactions or the proximity to quantum criticality or emergent superconductivity. It has only recently been discovered, that in fact, a large overlap exists between these rather separated communities: Experiments showed that the diffuse scattering signatures of the aforementioned disordered quantum spin systems can reach far into the mesoscopic nm-regime of magnetic SANS. Likewise, atomic scale order and disorder phenomena become more and more relevant for nanotextured systems, which may benefit from insight into the concepts of diffuse magnetic scattering. We intend to gather scientists working on the different applications of magnetic SANS and diffuse scattering and providing a stage for intra- and interdisciplinary scientific exchange. We expect that both scientists from communities will strongly benefit from such an interaction by sharing the latest trends and concepts that may become relevant in theory and experiment.