Small-Angle Neutron Scattering investigations of ferrofluids with different carrier liquids

The aim of this paper is to present a method to investigate the properties of magnetic fluids by means of small angle neutron scattering (SANS). Ferrofluids are dispersions of small, single-domain magnetic particles suspended in a fluid carrier. The neutron scattering methods have been largely used the last two decades for the determination of structural properties of magnetic liquids at microscopic level. There can be investigated the structure of the particle, the aggregation phenomena, the magnetic liquid dynamics, particle-surfactant interaction, surfactant liquid-base interaction and structure and magnetic behavior of the samples. SANS is often used in structural studies of ferrofluids exploring two specific features of neutrons, the possibility of wide contrast variation using protonated/deuterated components and high magnetic scattering from ferromagnetics. This method can be effectively used for determination of the structural parameters of ferrofluids at the scale interval of 1-100 nm. In previous SANS experiments with ferrofluids of the same type it was shown that the nuclear scattering is described well by the spherical core-shell model (magnetite core plus surfactant shell) in a wide interval of momentum transfer (0.05 - 5 nm-1) and no significant effects of aggregation and interparticle interaction were observed in this interval for the magnetite concentration up to 5 vol. %. Experiments on small angle neutron scattering were carried out on SANS instrument YuMO in function at IBR-2 high pulsed reactor at the Frank Laboratory of Neutron Physics, Joint Institute of Nuclear Research, Dubna, Russia. (authors)