Geballe Laboratory for Advanced Materials, Stanford University, Stanford, California 94305, USA.
Nat Commun. 2011 Aug 23;2:445. doi: 10.1038/ncomms1449.
At extreme pressures and temperatures, such as those inside planets and stars, common materials form new dense phases with compacted atomic arrangements and unusual physical properties. The synthesis and study of new phases of matter at pressures above 100 GPa and temperatures above 10(4) K--warm dense matter--may reveal the functional details of planet and star interiors, and may lead to materials with extraordinary properties. Many phases have been predicted theoretically that may be realized once appropriate formation conditions are found. Here we report the synthesis of a superdense stable phase of body-centred-cubic aluminium, predicted by first-principles theories to exist at pressures above 380 GPa. The superdense Al phase was synthesized in the non-equilibrium conditions of an ultrafast laser-induced microexplosion confined inside sapphire (α-Al(2)O(3)). Confined microexplosions offer a strategy to create and recover high-density polymorphs, and a simple method for tabletop study of warm dense matter.
在极端的压力和温度条件下，如行星和恒星内部，常见的物质会形成新的致密相，具有致密的原子排列和不寻常的物理性质。在超过 100GPa 的压力和超过 10^4K（温稠密物质）的温度下合成和研究物质的新相，可以揭示行星和恒星内部的功能细节，并可能产生具有特殊性质的材料。许多理论上预测的相，一旦找到合适的形成条件，就有可能实现。在这里，我们报告了体心立方铝的一种超密稳定相的合成，该相是由第一性原理理论预测在超过 380GPa 的压力下存在的。超密 Al 相是在蓝宝石（α-Al2O3）内部的超快激光诱导微爆炸的非平衡条件下合成的。限制微爆炸为创造和恢复高密度多形体提供了一种策略，也是在台式设备上研究温稠密物质的一种简单方法。
