Dynamic critical scattering near the smectic-A—nematic phase transition in CBOOA

Abstract High resolution neutron quasielastic scattering has been applied to a study on the critical dynamics near the smectic-A—nematic phase transition in CBOOA. A line narrowing is observed for a certain value of the momentum transfer. We interpret this narrowing as a critical slowing down of the smectic order parameter fluctuations near the transition temperature T SN . The relaxation times vary between 10 -8 and 10 -7 sec for a temperature interval of 2 K below T SN .