Speaker
Description
Nanoscale emergent textures, such as magnetic domains and superconducting vortices, are often mobile within their host materials. Their dynamics can be remarkably rich, giving rise to phenomena and functionalities with enormous technological potential. At the same time, both the formation and dynamics of these textures are strongly coupled to heterogeneities in the host material. This promises a powerful means of control, but the details remain poorly understood.
A central challenge is to directly observe the interplay between dynamics and disorder. This interplay is largely inaccessible to conventional techniques that average over dimensions assumed to be homogeneous or periodic, obscuring the physics that ultimately govern collective behavior.
Here, I will discuss how advanced X-ray microscopy, combined in a multimodal approach with electron and scanning probe microscopy, can access this previously uncharted regime and uncover behavior that is unexpected, unexplained, or even thought impossible. I will conclude with a perspective on the opportunities for this research at next-generation large-scale facilities such as ALBA-II.