Preface

Abstract

The 12th International Conference on Polarised Neutrons for Condensed Matter Investigations (PNCMI 2018) was held from 3rd-6th July 2018 at Milton Hill near Abingdon, UK. 105 registered participants attended the conference which benefitted from unusually glorious summer weather in the peaceful surroundings of the house. This biennial meeting was inaugurated in Dubna (Russia) in 1996 and since then has been the main forum for condensed matter researchers and polarized neutron instrument scientists to get together to discuss current scientific and technical challenges in the field of polarized neutron scattering, as well as highlighting recent achievements and challenges.The PNCMI 2018 conference programme continued this tradition of providing a broad overview of both cutting edge science enabled by polarised neutron methods and technical developments that push the boundaries of neutron science. Of the many scientific highlights from the conference presented in this volume of proceedings, the paper of Prof. Stephen Lovesey (Rutherford Appleton Laboratory, UK) et al. on the discovery of unusual time- and parity-odd multipoles (anapoles) in a long-studied actinide intermetallic deserves particular mention, as does the fine work of Dr. Stephane Raymond (CEA-Grenoble, France) et al., which shows an unusual cancellation of the magnetic and nuclear intensities in the excitation spectrum of a magnetocaloric material. A particular standout technical achievement is presented in a paper by Dr Stephan Sponar (TU Wien, Austria) and co-workers on the ongoing development of a compact interferometer to study a previously contentious “which-way” measurement of neutron trajectories, highlighting the strength of polarised neutrons as a quantum mechanical probe.PNCMI 2018 was preceded by a polarised neutron summer school on the two days prior to the conference, organised by staff at the ISIS pulsed Neutron and Muon source of the STFC-Rutherford Appleton Laboratory. 15 PhD students attended lectures presented by Prof. Ken Andersen (European Spallation Source, Sweden), Dr. Jörg Voigt (FZ-Jülich, Germany), Dr. Joe Paddison (University of Cambridge, UK) and ISIS polarized neutron instrument scientists. Practical sessions on ISIS instruments included; polarised neutron reflection, 3He spin filters, and polarised single crystal diffraction. One of the great successes of PNCMI 2018 was the large attendance by an international cohort of PhD students and their very impressive contributions to the conference programme. The PhD poster prizes (sponsored by Oxford Instruments, UK) were awarded to Niels Geerits (TU Wien, Austria / TU Delft, Netherlands) presenting a novel time-of-flight-MIEZE spectrometer, and Gesara Bimashofer (Paul Scherrer Institut, Switzerland) for a polarized neutron reflectometry study of lithium-intercalated manganite thin-films. The future of polarized neutron scattering is in very safe and capable hands.The organisers would like to take this opportunity to gratefully acknowledge the support of the international advisory committee and the conference sponsors; ISIS (UK), Oxford Instruments (UK), The Institute of Physics (UK), The European Spallation Source (Sweden), Swiss Neutronics (Switzerland), Ansto (Australia) and the Institut Laue-Langevin (France). Special thanks are due to staff at Milton Hill for their hard work during the conference, and to Claire Garland of the Institute of Physics and her team for their excellent organizational support.The next International Conference on Polarised Neutrons for Condensed Matter Investigations will take place in Maryland in 2020 and will hosted by the NIST Center for Neutron Research (NCNR).Ross Stewart (Conference Chair)Gøran Nilsen (Editor)Rob Dalgliesh (Editor)