Abstract
Measurements of the decay of electric fields, formed spontaneously within vapour-deposited films ofcis-methyl formate, provide the first direct assessment of the energy barrier to secondary relaxation in a molecular glass. At temperatures far below the glass transition temperature, the mechanism of relaxation is shown to be through hindered molecular rotation. Magnetically-polarised neutron scattering experiments exclude diffusion, which is demonstrated to take place only close to the glass transition temperature.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Pages (from-to) | 6368-6371 |
| Number of pages | 4 |
| Journal | Chemical Communications |
| Volume | 57 |
| Issue number | 52 |
| DOIs | |
| State | Published - Jul 4 2021 |
Funding
AC&MRVJ thank the Danish National Research Foundation (Center for Interstellar Catalysis, DNRF150 & Center for Materials Crystallography, DNRF93, respectively) and the Danish Agency for Science, Technology, and Innovation for funding the instrument center DANSCATT. This research used resources at the Spallation Neutron Source, a DOE Office of Science User Facility operated by the Oak Ridge National Laboratory. We thank H. Ambaye & A. C. Steffen during the preparation of the equipment for the NR experiments; and Drs M. Milas, U. Mueller and I. Kantor at the MAX IV Lab. during beam time at the BioMAX beamline.
| Funders | Funder number |
|---|---|
| Danmarks Grundforskningsfond | DNRF93, DNRF150 |
| Danish Agency for Science and Higher Education | |
| DanScatt |