Geerits Niels, Lemmel Hartmut, Berger Anna-Sophie, Sponar Stephan
Atominstitut, Technische Universität Wien, Stadionallee 2, 1020 Vienna, Austria.
Institut Laue-Langevin, 71 Avenue des Martyrs, CS 20156, 38042 Grenoble Cedex 9, France.
Commun Phys. 2023;6(1):209. doi: 10.1038/s42005-023-01318-6. Epub 2023 Aug 9.
Neutron Orbital Angular Momentum (OAM) is an additional quantum mechanical degree of freedom, useful in quantum information, and may provide more complete information on the neutron scattering amplitude of nuclei. Various methods for producing OAM in neutrons have been discussed. In this work we generalize magnetic methods which employ coherent averaging and apply this to neutron interferometry. Two aluminium prisms are inserted into a nested loop interferometer to generate a phase vortex lattice with significant extrinsic OAM, 〈〉 ≈ 0.35, on a length scale of ≈ 220 μm, transverse to the propagation direction. Our generalized method exploits the strong nuclear interaction, enabling a tighter lattice. Combined with recent advances in neutron compound optics and split crystal interferometry our method may be applied to generate intrinsic neutron OAM states. Finally, we assert that, in its current state, our setup is directly applicable to anisotropic ultra small angle neutron scattering.
中子轨道角动量（OAM）是一种额外的量子力学自由度，在量子信息中很有用，并且可能提供关于原子核中子散射振幅的更完整信息。已经讨论了在中子中产生OAM的各种方法。在这项工作中，我们推广了采用相干平均的磁方法，并将其应用于中子干涉测量。将两个铝棱镜插入嵌套环干涉仪中，以在横向于传播方向的约220μm长度尺度上产生具有显著外在OAM（〈〉≈0.35）的相位涡旋晶格。我们的广义方法利用了强核相互作用，能够形成更紧密的晶格。结合中子复合光学和分裂晶体干涉测量的最新进展，我们的方法可用于产生本征中子OAM态。最后，我们断言，就目前的状态而言，我们的装置可直接应用于各向异性超小角中子散射。
