Local structure of liquid and undercooled liquid Cu probed by x-ray absorption spectroscopy

In this work we report about a recent XAS (x-ray absorption spectroscopy) experiment aimed to study the local structure of liquid and undercooled copper, a typical close-packed liquid metal, under high-pressure conditions. In our study we have obtained new experimental data of liquid Cu under high pressure and high-temperature conditions using synchrotron radiation at the ESRF and a large-volume Paris-Edinburgh cell. We have studied the extension of the undercooling region as well as possible modifications of the local structure as a function of pressure, using XAS data-analysis. Liquid copper has been undercooled up to 300 degrees C below the melting point at high pressures up to 3.3 GPa.