Spectroscopic Imaging of Water and its Application to Fluid Dynamics & Crystallisation Kinetics

This proposal seeks to explore how pulsed-neutron imaging could be extended beyond the state-of-the-art, in order to provide novel insights into the physico-chemical properties of systems devoid of long-range order. To this end, we have capitalised from new capabilities on VESUVIO to obtain total cross-section data for water over an unprecedented energy-transfer range, from meV to tens of eV. In the low-energy regime, these data can be used to obtain water number densities and temperatures with an accuracy of a few %, thus opening up entirely new opportunities for a plethora of applications of pulsed-neutron imaging. As a first demonstrator on IMAT, we would like to use a so-called ‘natural circulation cavity,’ in order to visualise water concentrations, temperature gradients, and crystallisation kinetics as a function of both space & time.