E. Ya. Rudavskii

Observation of anomalously fast diffusion in 3He–4He solid solutions near the BCC-HCP transition

The pulsed NMR technique was used to investigate diffusion on the BCC-HCP phase-equilibrium and melting curves of a dilute solution of 3He in 4He. The contributions from all coexisting phases were identified using the spin-echo method. It is established that, along with the contributions from the equilibrium BCC and HCP phases or from bulk liquid (in the melting curve measurements), there is an additional diffusional process that is characterized by an anomalously high diffusion coefficient. It is found that the latter is close to the diffusion coefficient in liquid helium, while the diffusion itself is spatially restricted. The observed effect may be caused by the formation of liquid droplets in the course of the BCC-HCP transition.

Resonance excitation of single rotons in He II by an electromagnetic wave. Spectral line shape

The amplitude-frequency characteristic of the spectral line of electromagnetic absorption in liquid helium is measured in the frequency range 40–200GHz at temperatures in the interval 1.4–2.75K. It is found that in the roton frequency region a narrow resonance absorption line on a broad pedestal is observed. The results are compared with data on the roton spectrum found in neutron scattering experiments in liquid helium. The narrow line is due to the creation of a single roton. It is shown that the momentum conservation law is satisfied on account of the transfer of momentum to the superfluid component. The analogy of this effect with the Mossbauer effect is pointed out.

Contribution of phonon and vacancion excitations to the thermodynamic properties of solid helium

Precision measurements of the temperature dependence of the pressure are made on high-quality crystals of He4 and He3–He4 solutions grown at a constant volume. The phonon and vacancion contributions to the pressure are separated on the basis of the Debye model for the phonons and the model of wide-band vacancion excitations. This approach is also used to analyze all the other available thermodynamic data for the solid pure isotopes of helium and their solutions. This yields information about the Debye temperature and vacancy activation energy, and a universal dependence of these parameters on the molar volume is found for He3, He4, and He3–He4 solutions. The values found for the corresponding Gruneisen parameters turn out to be independent of the molar volume.

Sound and dissipation coefficients in the phonon-impurity system of 3He-4He solutions

The phonon-impurity system of dilute solutions of 3He in 4He is studied experimentally and theoretically using an acoustic technique. The sound velocity and absorption measurements make it possible to identify the theoretically predicted new mechanism of phonon relaxation with anomalous dispersion in the presence of impurities. A kinetic problem for arbitrary frequencies is solved, which also enables us to obtain all the dissipation coefficients of the solutions and to explain the experimental data on second-sound absorption, thermal conductivity, and heat pulse propagation. The relation is considered between relaxation processes in a phonon-impurity system and the phonon spectrum dispersion in 3He-4He solutions.

Relation between the temperature gradient and concentration gradient in superfluid 3He–4He mixtures

The temperature and concentration gradients ∇T and ∇x created by a heat flow in a superfluid 3He–4He mixture with a concentration of 9.8% 3He are measured in the steady state in the temperature range T=70–500 mK. It is found that the ratio ∇x/∇T obtained in the experiment can be described on the basis of a dependence of the osmotic pressure on the temperature and concentration. The data are used to find the thermodiffusion ratio and, hence, the thermodiffusion coefficient of this mixture.

Observation of Andreev-Pushkarov vacancy clusters in phase-separated solid solutions of 4He in 3He

New features are observed for the pressure in a phase-separated dilute solid solution of 4He in 3He subjected to multiple temperature cycling within the phase-separation region. The results are explained within the framework of the hypothesis of A.F. Andreev and D.I. Pushkarov that the vacancies in a crystal without ideal periodicity are surrounded by clusters with a periodic structure. The equation for determining the radius of a cluster of pure 4He in a solution of 4He in 3He is refined. This hypothesis is shown to provide quantitative agreement between the calculated and experimental data under the assumption that the homogenization of the phase-separated solution is accompanied by the formation of metastable vacancies with a concentration of ∼(4–5)×10−5.

Giant asymmetry of the processes of separation and homogenization of 3He–4He solid mixtures

A comparison of the kinetics of the separation processes and homogenization of 3He–4He solid mixtures is made with the use of precision barometry for samples of three types—dilute mixtures of 3He in 4He and of 4He in 3He and concentrated 3He–4He mixtures. It is found that in all types of mixtures studied the rate of the initial stage of homogenization can exceed the rate of separation by more than 500 times. An appreciable rate of phase separation in the concentrated mixtures, where, according to existing ideas, the impurity atoms in quantum crystals should be localized, attests to a new, unknown mechanism of mass transfer under those conditions, while the fast homogenization indicates that this process is nondiffusional in nature.

Kinetics of the phase transition in solid solutions of 4He in 3He at different degrees of supersaturation

Precision measurements of the pressure during phase separation in samples of solid solutions of 4He in 3He have been used to obtain data on the characteristic times of the phase transition. A processing of the results gives additional evidence supporting the view that homogeneous nucleation is realized in 3He–4He solid solutions at significant supercoolings and heterogeneous nucleation at the smallest supercoolings. Two different ways are proposed for comparing the results with a theoretical calculation taking into account the processes at the boundary of a nucleus of the new phase. Both give roughly similar values of the coefficient of surface tension at the nucleus–matrix boundary, and those values agree with those obtained in other studies. It is conjectured that the bcc–hcp transition has a substantial influence on the kinetics of separation at the lowest supersaturations.

Detection of fluctuation effects near the phase separation temperature of concentrated 3He-4He solid solutions

A precision barometric study has revealed unusual behavior of the pressure of 3He−4He solid solutions with a concentration of around 30% 3He: in the pre-separation region the pressure increases with decreasing temperature long before the start of the phase transition. It is established that such an anomaly is due to correlation effects in the impurity subsystem which give rise to large-scale fluctuations of the impurity concentration, and the fluctuation contribution to the pressure is much greater than the phonon contribution. Quantitative agreement between the experimental data and the proposed theory is obtained, and it is shown that the observed temperature dependence of the pressure in the pre-separation and metastable regions can be explained only when the long-range character of the interaction between impurities is taken into account.

Attainable Supersaturation of Superfluid 3He-4He Solutions and the Role of Quantized Vortices

The earlier systematic measurements of attainable supersaturations of superfliud3He-4He solutions depending on temperature and pressure have been continued. The experiments were carried out at continuously varied solution concentration and at constant temperature and pressure. The results obtained are analysed using various models of nucleation in supersaturated liquid solutions. The fast nucleation line which is constructed from experimental results is in strong contrast with the kinetic theory of homogeneous nucleation for supersaturated3He-4He solutions. It is shown that reasonable agreement with experimental results can be obtained assuming that completed centres of nucleation generated on quantized vortices in superfluid liquid are available.