Inelastic X-Ray Scattering as a Probe of the Many-Body Local-Field Factor in Metals

Plasmons in strongly coupled shock-compressed matter

We present the first measurements of the plasmon dispersion and damping in laser shock-compressed solid matter. Petawatt laser produced K-α radiation scatters on boron targets compressed by a 10 ns-long 400 J laser pulse. In the vicinity of the Fermi momentum, the scattering spectra show dispersionless, collisionally damped plasmons, indicating a strongly coupled electron liquid. These observations agree with calculations that include the Born-Mermin approximation to account for electron-ion collisional damping and local field corrections reflecting electron-electron correlations.

Dynamical structure factor of the homogeneous electron liquid: its accurate shape and the interpretation of experiments on aluminum

Based on a highly self-consistent theory maintaining the exact functional relations between the self-energy and the vertex part, we evaluate the dynamical structure factor S(q,omega) of the electron liquid. We find striking deviations from S(q,omega) in the random-phase approximation (RPA) for /q/>p(F); besides a broad peak in the one-pair excitation region as seen in the RPA, a clear shoulder appears along a steepened slope at low omega due to electron-hole multiple scattering, and a flattened structure follows due to inseparable interference between one-pair and multipair excitations. Our result agrees with experiments on Al on the whole. The remaining discrepancy is ascribed to the band-structure-induced effect.