Credit: Argonne National Laboratory
Scientists validated a decades-old prediction of a crossover from random (left) to coherent (right) electronic excitations upon cooling a single crystal of a cerium palladium compound. Image on the left shows the theoretical intensity at higher temperature where the electron excitations are random (dark blue). The image on the right with highs and lows in intensity (yellow to blue) corresponds to low temperature. The theoretical (left half) and inelastic neutron scattering data (right half) are overlaid for comparison. The strong variation in intensity at low temperature is due to the emergence of a coherent wave-like behavior of electronic excitations.