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Physics & Astronomy

Branton Campbell

Branton J. Campbell

Associate Professor

Department of Physics & Astronomy

Brigham Young University
Provo, UT 84602,USA

Tel: 801-422-5758   Fax: 801-422-0553

Email: branton_campbell@byu.edu

URL: http://physics.byu.edu/faculty/campbell/

Research Interests

I apply state-of-the-art x-ray and neutron scattering techniques to study local and long-range structures in a variety of complex solids, including fast-ion conductors, ferroelectric relaxors, high-temperature superconductors, and colossal magnetoresistive manganites, where nanoscale structural features influence macroscopic physical properties.  This includes the development of symmetry-mode analysis as a tool for the determination, refinement and interpretation of distorted structures involving lattice strains, atomic displacements, magnetic moments and occupational orderings at both commensurate and incommensurate wavevectors.
Featured Research
Advanced Scattering Probes of Material Structure
BYU physics researchers use some of the world's brightest x-ray and neutron sources to study a variety of useful materials, such as superconductors, piezoelectrics and solid electrolytes. At the Advanced Photon Source at Argonne National Laboratory, 7 GeV electrons travel around a one-kilometer synchrotron ring at nearly the speed of light, emitting tangential Bremsstrahlung x-rays (much like the tangential spray from a leaky pail of water swung in a wide circle with a rope). At the newly-constructed Spallation Neutron Source at Oak Ridge National Laboratory, accelerator-driven proton pulses bombard a liquid-mercury target, knocking (i.e. spalling) neutrons from the target nuclei, which are then cooled in a moderator and collimated into beams. [Read More]
 
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