Anomalous X-ray Scattering on Semiconducting Glasses at ESRF: Review in Recent Fifteen Years

The most difficult issue for the structural characterizations for noncrystalline multi-component materials is to determine partial structures because n(n + 1)/2 scattering experiments with different scattering cross-sections are necessary for n-component materials. More than three decades have already passed through since anomalous X-ray scattering (AXS) using synchrotron radiation (SR) was expected as a promising tool for investigating partial structures. Compared with a related method, X-ray absorption fine structure, however, AXS is still rarely used owing to difficulties in the experiments and data analyses. We have developed a new detecting system, which can fully utilize intense X-ray fluxes from third-generation SR facilities. Using this detecting system, we have carried out many AXS experiments at the beamline BM02 of the ESRF on several semiconducting glasses. The obtained differential structure factors were analyzed using reverse Monte Carlo modeling to draw three-dimensional atomic configurations. In this article, we review results of semiconducting glasses, and describe the structure-property relations in these glasses.