The application of pressure has been speculated to boost the search for high-temperature superconductors, especially in superhydrides. However, the applied pressure as high as hundreds of GPa needed to create superconductivity in those materials limits their technological application. Finding a route to achieve the high-temperature superconductivity at near-ambient conditions is attractive. By choosing a phase-change alloy Ge2Sb2Te5, we study the phase evolution of this material with pressure from the trigonal phase through the amorphous to the body-centered cubic one by the measurements of x-ray diffraction, Raman scattering, resistivity, and Hall coefficient. Superconductivity is observed to take place in the last two phases and can maintain at nearly ambient pressure in the decompression run. Pressure-induced disorder is found to be the key for holding superconductivity in the compressed phase-change alloy.

Nitrogen and water are very abundant in nature; however, the way they chemically react at extreme pressure-temperature conditions is unknown. Below 6 GPa, they have been reported to form clathrate compounds. Here, we present Raman spectroscopy and x-ray diffraction studies in the H2O-N-2 system at high pressures up to 140 GPa. We find that clathrates, which form locally in our diamond cell experiments above 0.3 GPa, transform into a fine grained state above 6 GPa, while there is no sign of formation of mixed compounds. We point out size effects in fine grained crystallites, which result in peculiar Raman spectra in the molecular regime, but x-ray diffraction shows no additional phase or deviation from the bulk behavior of familiar solid phases. Moreover, we find no sign of ice doping by nitrogen, even in the regimes of stability of nonmolecular nitrogen.

Synthesis and characterization of nitrogen-rich materials is important for the design of novel high energy density materials due to extremely energetic low-order nitrogen-nitrogen bonds. The balance between the energy output and stability may be achieved if polynitrogen units are stabilized by resonance as in cyclo-N-5(-) pentazolate salts. Here we demonstrate the synthesis of three oxygen-free pentazolate salts Na2N5, NaN5 and NaN5 center dot N-2 from sodium azide NaN3 and molecular nitrogen N-2 at similar to 50 GPa. NaN5 center dot N-2 is a metal-pentazolate framework (MPF) obtained via a self-templated synthesis method with nitrogen molecules being incorporated into the nanochannels of the MPF. Such self-assembled MPFs may be common in a variety of ionic pentazolate compounds. The formation of Na2N5 demonstrates that the cyclo-N-5 group can accommodate more than one electron and indicates the great accessible compositional diversity of pentazolate salts.

Inspired by the rich physical properties of IV-VI compounds, we choose polycrystalline Pb0.99Cr0.01Se to investigate its structural, vibrational, and electrical transport properties under pressure up to 50 GPa. The structural transitions from the B1 to Pnma phase and then to the B2 phase in this sample are verified by the x-ray diffraction and Raman scattering measurements. The formation of the intermediate phase is suggested to be mediated by Peierls distortion, and the broad hump in the temperature-dependent resistivity in the intermediate phase gives further evidence of this phenomenon. When the material evolves into the B2 phase, superconductivity is observed to emerge, accompanied by suppressing the broad hump of resistivity at intermediate temperatures. Meanwhile, Hall coefficient measurements indicate that the carrier type changes during the structural transitions. These results suggest that the superconductivity in the B2 phase for this material is originated by "melting" the Peierls lattice distortion. By extending the present findings to other similar IV-VI semiconductors, we propose that all group IV-VI compounds could exhibit superconductivity in their B2 phase due to the lattice melting at high pressures.

Most of the studied two-dimensional (2D) materials are based on highly symmetric hexagonal structural motifs. In contrast, lower-symmetry structures may have exciting anisotropic properties leading to various applications in nano-electronics. In this work we report the synthesis of nickel diazenide NiN2 which possesses atomic-thick layers comprised of Ni2N3 pentagons forming Cairo-type tessellation. The layers of NiN2 are weakly bonded with the calculated exfoliation energy of 0.72 J/m(2), which is just slightly larger than that of graphene. The compound crystallizes in the space group of the ideal Cairo tiling (P4/mbm) and possesses significant anisotropy of elastic properties. The single-layer NiN2 is a direct-band-gap semiconductor, while the bulk material is metallic. This indicates the promise of NiN2 to be a precursor of a pentagonal 2D material with a tunable direct band gap.

The high-precision X-ray diffraction setup for work with diamond anvil cells (DAC5) in interaction chamber 2 (IC2) of the High Energy Density instrument of the European X-ray Free-Electron Laser is described. This includes beamline optics, sample positioning and detector systems located in the multipurpose vacuum chamber. Concepts for pump-probe X-ray diffraction experiments in the DAC are described and their implementation demonstrated during the First User Community Assisted Commissioning experiment. X-ray heating and diffraction of Bi under pressure, obtained using 20 fs X-ray pulses at 17.8 keV and 2.2 MHz repetition, is illustrated through splitting of diffraction peaks, and interpreted employing finite element modeling of the sample chamber in the DAC.

We have performed a combined experimental and theoretical study of ethane and methane at high pressures of up to 120 GPa at 300 K using x-ray diffraction and Raman spectroscopies and the USPEX ab initio evolutionary structural search algorithm, respectively. For ethane, we have determined the crystallization point, for room temperature, at 2.7 GPa and also the low pressure crystal structure (phase A). This crystal structure is orientationally disordered (plastic phase) and deviates from the known crystal structures for ethane at low temperatures. Moreover, a pressure induced phase transition has been identified, for the first time, at 13.6 GPa to a monoclinic phase B, the structure of which is solved based on good agreement with the experimental results and theoretical predictions. For methane, our x-ray diffraction measurements are in agreement with the previously reported high-pressure structures and equation of state (EOS). We have determined the EOSs of ethane and methane, which provides a solid basis for the discussion of their relative stability at high pressures.

In the phase diagram of water, superionic ices with highly mobile protons within the stable oxygen sublattice have been predicted at high pressures. However, the existence of superionic ices and the location of the melting line have been challenging to determine from both theory and experiments, yielding contradictory results depending on the employed techniques and the interpretation of the data. Here we report high-pressure and high-temperature synchrotron X-ray diffraction and optical spectroscopy measurements of water in a laser-heated diamond anvil cell and reveal first-order phase transitions to ices with body-centred and face-centred cubic oxygen lattices. Based on the distinct density, increased optical conductivity and the greatly decreased fusion enthalpies, we assign these observed structures to the theoretically predicted superionic ice phases. Our measurements determine the pressure-temperature stability fields of superionic ice phases and the melting line, suggesting the presence of face-centred cubic superionic ice in water-rich giant planets, such as Neptune and Uranus. The melting line determined here is at higher temperatures than previously determined in static compression experiments, but it is in agreement with theoretical calculations and data from shock-wave experiments.

Single-crystal synchrotron x-ray diffraction, Raman spectroscopy, and first principles calculations have been used to identify the structure of the high-pressure (HP) phase of molecular methane above 20 GPa up to 71 GPa at room temperature. The structure of the HP phase is trigonal R3, which can be represented as a distortion of the cubic phase B, previously documented at 7-15 GPa and confirmed here. The positions of hydrogen atoms in the HP phase have been obtained from first principles calculations, which also demonstrated the stability of this structure above 260 K at 25 GPa. The molecules occupy four different crystallographic sites in phase B and 11 sites in the HP phase, which result in splitting of molecular stretching modes detected in Raman spectroscopy and assigned here based on a good agreement with the Raman spectra calculated from the first principles. Our study points out to a single HP phase unlike up to three HP phases proposed previously based on the Raman spectroscopy results only.

A laser heating system for samples confined in diamond anvil cells paired with in situ X-ray diffraction measurements at the Extreme Conditions Beamline of PETRA III is presented. The system features two independent laser configurations (on-axis and off-axis of the X-ray path) allowing for a broad range of experiments using different designs of diamond anvil cells. The power of the continuous laser source can be modulated for use in various pulsed laser heating or flash heating applications. An example of such an application is illustrated here on the melting curve of iron at megabar pressures. The optical path of the spectroradiometry measurements is simulated with ray-tracing methods in order to assess the level of present aberrations in the system and the results are compared with other systems, that are using simpler lens optics. Based on the ray-tracing the choice of the first achromatic lens and other aspects for accurate temperature measurements are evaluated.